Spill Baby Spill?
by Cynthia Owen Philip

Late last June, when the issue of hydraulic fracturing was suddenly making headlines throughout the country, it dawned on me that I knew virtually nothing about it. Hydrofracking, as it’s mostly called today—when not simply reduced to fracking—is an evolving way of extracting natural gas from a band of grit deposited in glacial times, several kilometers beneath the surface of the earth. Many expect it to become the principal fuel source within our country. Fortunately the distinguished Cary Institute of Ecosystems Studies in Millbrook was offering a talk on the subject, so off I went.

The presentation was made by the scientist Robert B. Jackson, part of a team from Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment, together the University’s Biology Department. To give us a firm grasp of state of the art of hydro-fracking, he described the natural gas–laden grit in western Pennsylvania and New York State called the Marcellus and Utica shales. To create a single well, millions of liters of water drive a mix of sand and chemicals deep into the shale at high pressures. This mix is then forced to take a right angle, sending the blasting charges upwards and laterally for many more kilometers, until the widest possible area is broken open. The natural gas entrapped below rises to the surface, where it is scrubbed and collected in the exploiting companies’ pipelines for distribution. The residual water, full of chemicals and also rising to the surface, is treated in several different ways. In some cases, for instance, it has been spread on dirt roads to keep down the dust churned up by the exploiters’ huge machines; in others it has been sprayed on vegetation, killing it. But it is generally kept in pools surrounding the hydrofracking towers.

Spellbinding technology! However, as Jackson’s talk went on, it became painfully apparent that since the natural gas exploiters are private companies whose drilling methods and mixes are regarded as proprietary information (like the formula for Coca Cola), the actual processes being used need never be disclosed—whether to rival companies or the public. Even the most seasoned scientist cannot find out, say, what chemicals are being added to the brew or what pressures are employed. Halliburton, which developed the technology, leads the exploiting companies. In the beginning I did not recognize the names of the other companies that were buying up the Marcellus and Utica shale “plays,” as they are called in the industry. Today the frenzy to acquire “plays” is so great that international oil and gas companies are gobbling up the smaller fry.

Undaunted by the proprietary information obstacle, and believing there were grave environmental implications to unfettered hydrofracking, the Duke University scientists persuaded 68 landowners in north central pennsylvania and a few over the border in central New York, who had leased their land to hydrofrackers, to allow them to investigate the quality of their ground water wells, which ranged from 36 to 190 meters deep, that is, from one to two kilometers above the shale. Jackson wound up his talk with a summary of this study’s findings, published in May in the prestigious, peer-reviewed Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA. Yes, they found that methane concentrations in the drinking water of those wells near 3000 feet of an active drilling site were on average 17 times higher than those not within that range, that the methane in enclosed places was strong enough to be an asphyxiant and an explosive fire hazard. Although dissolved methane in drinking water is not currently classified as a health hazard, the concentrations in 85 percent of the drinking water wells fell above the national health hazard level. However, the negative bent of these findings was compromised when the Duke scientists extended their study to look into whether the appearance of methane and other contaminants in the drinking water wells might not be a natural phenomenon. They stated that methane migration through the one-to two-kilometer thick geological formations that overlie the Marcellus and Utica shales were more likely caused by “leaky well casings... and the many older, uncased wells drilled and abandoned over the last century and a half in Pennsylvania and New York.” They then called for still more studies. The exploiting companies were so happy with Duke’s findings that they adopted their recommendations as a fine defense for doing as they pleased.

Much to the astonishment of even the National Academy of Scientists, the Duke University report became one of the most read and quoted articles published in that issue of the Proceedings. More than 1700 articles were written about it worldwide, stimulating conversation about the pros and cons of hydrofracking. This discussion was fired further by a powerful documentary, Gasland, released in December 2010 in various formats.

Gasland
Made by Josh Fox, a filmmaker living in western Pennsylvania who was being pressured to lease his land to drillers, the film aims to show the impact of hydrofracking on his neighbors’ environment. In a nearby town, Fox captures on film old time residents igniting their water taps, causing explosions. The water is full of sludge, tests high in methane and is literally undrinkable; they must buy water from the outside. Moreover, their families and farm animals are sickening. Hydrofracking has made the only way of life they know impossible. Their despair is palpable. Yet, the drillers deny all responsibility. A typical response is: “Get a lawyer.” A winner at Sundance, Gasland will also be shown on HBO through 2012.

Riverkeeper and Hudsonia
Such a graphic introduction to the downside of hydrofracking spurred me to search out more local authorities on the subject. It should not have surprised me to find that Riverkeeper was the feistiest of all and had been fighting hydrofracking publicly since 2008. The non-for-profit organization is responsible for the most impressive and useful body of work on the subject as it relates to the Hudson Valley. One of its most useful publications, the Industrial Gas Drilling Reporter, was launched on June 15, 2009. Its issues cover such items as the impacts of hydrofracking along with reports and legislation throughout the nation as well as from the more local scene. It has warned leasees about possible taxes due on direct payments from the extracting companies and royalties, if any. The twelfth issue is scheduled to come out after Labor Day. Riverkeeper was also the moving force behind Don’t Frack with NY Water, a branch organization that provides information and impetus for groups opposed to the process. A button from one of those groups is a bright red octagonal stop sign with the words “No Fracking Way” emblazoned across it. At one anti-fracking rally, folk singer Pete Seeger changed the chant “Drill, baby drill” to “Spill baby spill.”

The discussion of fracking is so hot now that it has become probably the most visible of Riverkeeper’s current activities. They were one of the over 100 state and national signatories of a petition to the EPA in Washington asking it to issue regulations requiring manufacturers of “chemical substances and mixtures used in oil and gas exploration or production” to reveal which ones they are producing. Apparently 322 harmful chemicals have been identified. The petition was launched on August 4 by Earthjustice, a litigating nonprofit, in rapid response to the EPA’s passage on July 28 of the Toxic Substances Control Act that set the first federal air standards for hydrofracked sites, part of the new Clean Air Act regulations. On the same day, Riverkeeper (with Delaware Riverkeeper Network and another group) brought a lawsuit with similar demands against the Delaware River Basin Commission, a commission of representatives of the governors of New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, along with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

In a different manner, Hudsonia Ltd. has also been studying the effects of hydrofracking for several years. A not-for-profit scientific research institute founded in 1981, it has no agenda except to study the full range of wildlife, from animals and plants to bugs and worms in order to preserve as much as possible of the balance of nature that it believes to be key to a fruitful human existence. Its latest study of hydrofracking, prepared for the Croton Watershed Clean Water Coalition, is “Impacts on Wildlife and Plants of Hydraulic Fracturing in the State Forests of New York.” The question asked Hudsonia’s chief scientist Erik Kivat and naturalist consultant Karen Schneller-McDonald by Croton Watershed: What if hydrofracking took place in the more than 786,000 acres of State forests within the exploitable Marcellus and Utica shales? Their answer: fragmentation of habitat, followed by impermeable surfaces, night lighting, salinization and siltation of waterways, air pollution, careless oil spills or disposal of returned water, and so on.

As an example of their findings I’ll combine the first two categories. Animals vital to the balance of nature cross roads to migrate between breeding areas, and also to use the edges of the road and sometimes the road itself for basking, dust bathing, picking up grit, feeding on seeds, fruits and incidental road kill and even nesting. Among them are turtles, snakes, salamanders and frogs, eastern screech owls, songbirds, squirrels, woodchucks, rabbits, weasels, opossums, raccoons and striped skunks as well as a variety of butterflies, dragonflies and other insects.

Both Riverkeeper and Hudsonia know that hydrofracking on the rivers and streams of the Catskills will inevitably sully the Hudson and its vital marshlands. In fact, the aquifers spread out to Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. East-flowing air currents from the Midwest already bring contamination to our area. Thousands of hydro-fracking “plays” in the Marcellus and Utica shales will increase that contamination. Also, I have in hand a map of New York State shale, made by a consultant as technical support to the NYS DEC, that shows a narrow strip of shale along the riverfront in Dutchess County and a small area in the Clermont section of Columbia County. I intend to investigate further.

The Governor’s Report
On Thursday, June 30, Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Department of Environmental Conservation released to the public an eight-page summary of its new recommendations for hydraulic fracturing. Eight days later the full report was issued as a PDF on line. Highlighted features of the proposed guidelines: “high-volume fracturing would be prohibited in NYC and Syracuse watersheds, including a buffer zone; drilling would be prohibited within primary aquifers and 500 feet of their boundaries; surface drilling would be prohibited on state-owned land including parks, forest areas, and wildlife management areas; high-volume fracturing will be permitted on privately-held lands under rigorous and effective controls; and DEC will issue regulations to codify these recommendations.”

Some things should be noted about Governor Cuomo and the NYS DEC. Those who work at the department serve at the pleasure of the governor. The Governor is very much in favor of private company development, believing it will bring jobs to the upstate New York area, although in Pennsylvania the workers have not been local but recruited from elsewhere. Their numbers are so great and their interest in the local environment so slight that in themselves they are putting added strains on Pennsylvania communities. Also, since 2008,the DEC staff has been reduced 28 per cent, four times more than the state average. Already hard pressed, they will find it impossible to do all the monitoring the new plan anticipates, and with straightened budgets, it will not be easy for the Governor to find the huge, competent corps of overseers his plan anticipates.

Despite all the exempted areas, 85 per cent of the Marcellus shales will be open to hydrofrackers. Several of the provisions governing their operations horrified me. Among them was a restatement of the hydrofrackers’ rights to safeguard their mixes and methods as proprietary information, squeezed in below a series of statements about the SGEIS requiring disclosure. Another is that only surface drilling is prohibited from state-owned lands. What about deep lateral extraction extending up to two kilometers or more? Closer to home, hydrofracking will be allowed 500 feet from a neighbor’s well. 500 feet! Does the governor have any idea how short a space that is? I live in Rhinecliff and it’s about the space between my property and several of my neighbors. Although I’ve been drinking treated river water, I also have on a corner of my property an old spring-fed well that holds a good level of water during the worst droughts. Just having it sharpens my appreciation of what the thousands of others within the permitted drilling area have to lose under this 500-foot provision.

The observation of Governor Cuomo’s DEC Commissioner Joseph Martens: “This report strikes the right balance between protecting our environment, watersheds, and drinking water and promoting economic growth.” Originally, the DEC planned to hold a 60-day public comment period commencing in August. True to form, Riverkeeper took a tough stance toward DEC’s present offering. The latest word from Katherine Hudson, its Watershed Program Director, is that the organization will push DEC to tighten the protections proposed for the New York City watershed, and demand a 180-day comment period, not the meagerly 60 days suggested by the Governor. Also, they are demanding separate meetings in major geographic areas so that every special need will be heard. The DEC paid attention to the latter demand: on July 27, the Governor presented the names of the heads of his upstate Regional Councils.

Hydofracking is an important issue. My advice is to download the Governor’s short form document. Talk with your neighbors and friends, know what’s at stake. Then, whatever your persuasion, act!

N.B.: Things are moving fast. As I write the NYS DEC has announced it is putting off its 60-day comment period until 2012. The hydraulic fracturing industry has launched a sophisticated media campaign about the wonderful number of jobs it is creating. The suit against the Delaware River Basin Commission may or may not be dismissed by the US Dept. of Justice, and an EPA spokesperson commenting to the media has said that the agency’s hands were tied by laws enacted in 2005 exempting hydrofracking from federal action until hydrofracking actually begins. Meanwhile, the Don’t Frack New York Water contingent is getting louder and louder.