Wayne National Forest in Ohio River Valley at center of debate

From an Article in the Wheeling Intelligencer, December 12, 2016

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A national forest in Ohio has closed its offices to the public through Tuesday, the day it auctions 1,600 acres of park land for fracking, in anticipation of extended public protests.

About 50 people demonstrated against the auction at Wayne National Forest headquarters in Nelsonville on Saturday. The Center for Biological Diversity says environmentalists and Native American groups participated. Similar protests have occurred in downtown Columbus.

Opponents also delivered more than 99,000 petition signatures to the U.S. Department of the Interior to stop Tuesday’s auction. A similar plan to lease fracking sites in the forest was dropped in 2011 after public outcry.

Opponents argue allowing fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, in the park will harm water systems and wildlife and destroy the park’s scenic beauty.

A Bureau of Land Management study found the high-pressure oil-and-gas drilling technique would have no significant environmental impact and would not violate any known environmental protection requirements or local, state, federal or tribal laws.
Drilling opponents dispute the bureau’s findings, which they say were based on a limited, outdated review. They’d like to see a new round of environmental analysis.
“They’re trying to cram everything into this outdated, 10-year-old bottle,” said Nathan Johnson, a natural resources attorney for the Ohio Environmental Council. “It’s inexcusable.”

In defending the process, U.S. Forest Service Eastern Region planning director Tony Erba said, “At the end of the day, it is a federal official’s decision to be made.”
A 30-day comment period was opened after the auction was announced in October. The newspaper reports the Bureau of Land Management is wading through 105 comments and expects to post complete responses to each by the end of Monday.

The 33 parcels up for auction lie in the far eastern section of the forest. The online sale Tuesday allows for exploration. Companies would have to file separately for a drilling application.

Protester Elizabeth Bowlen, of Columbus, told the paper she grew up near Marietta and spent time hiking, kayaking and camping in the national forest.
“A lot of people view national forests as protected for us and for biodiversity. I feel that is being threatened,” she said. “People are really shocked.”
Congressman Bill Johnson, a Marietta Republican, said the forest is different things to different people.

“It is my hope that this exhaustive review process continues to strike the appropriate balance between the legacy of energy production and recreation activities frequently enjoyed by many,” he said.

Also endrocrine disruption chemicals

Yale researchers have unpacked “the most expansive review of carcinogenicity of hydraulic fracturing-related chemicals in the published literature.”

From an Article by Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch.com, October 26, 2016

Yet another study has determined that hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, might be a major public health threat. In one of the most exhaustive reviews to date, researchers from the Yale School of Public Health have confirmed that many of the chemicals involved and released by the controversial drilling process can be linked to cancer.

“Previous studies have examined the carcinogenicity of more selective lists of chemicals,” lead author Nicole Deziel, Ph.D., assistant professor explained to the school. “To our knowledge, our analysis represents the most expansive review of carcinogenicity of hydraulic fracturing-related chemicals in the published literature.”

For the study, published in Science of the Total Environment, the researchers assessed the carcinogenicity of 1,177 water pollutants and 143 air pollutants released by the fracking process and from fracking wastewater. They found that 55 unique chemicals could be classified as known, probable or possible human carcinogens. They also specifically identified 20 compounds that had evidence of leukemia/lymphoma risk.

One of the scarier parts from this study is that the researchers could not completely unpack the health hazards of fracking’s entire chemical cocktail. More than 80 percent of the chemicals lacked sufficient data on cancer-causing potential, “highlighting an important knowledge gap,” the school noted.

The unconventional drilling rush in the U.S. has expanded to as many as 30 states, spelling major consequences to the air we breathe and the water we drink. The Wall Street Journal reported in 2013 that more than 15 million Americans lived within a mile of a well.

The biggest concern is for people and especially children with fracking operations right in their backyards. In fact, Environment America found that more than 650,000 kindergarten through 12th grade children in nine states attend school within one mile of a fracked oil or gas well.

“Because children are a particularly vulnerable population, research efforts should first be directed toward investigating whether exposure to hydraulic fracturing is associated with an increased risk,” Deziel said.

Per the study, “Childhood leukemia in particular is a public health concern related to [unconventional oil and gas] development, and it may be an early indicator of exposure to environmental carcinogens due to the relatively short disease latency and vulnerability of the exposed population.”

According to the school, the researchers are now taking air and water samples in a community living near a fracking operation. They are testing for the presence of known and suspected carcinogens and will determine whether these people have been exposed to these compounds, and if so, at what concentrations.

See also: www.FrackCheckWV.net

Pipeline services by Access Midstream of the Industrial Park at Jane Lew

Perspectives on Fracking in Central West Virginia

Commentary by S. Tom Bond, Retired Chemistry Professor & Resident Farmer, Lewis County, WV

By luck of the draw, I happen to be in a good spot to observe activity in the Southern Marcellus area. The farm I have lived on for over 50 years is about two miles from the Lewis County Industrial Park, one of the largest concentrations of drilling industry in the Marcellus. The Park has numerous companies with familiar names and smaller outfits are situated in and around it. Being on I-79, these have access to work as far north as Washington, Pennsylvania and all the way to the edge of the region south. The main truck stop between Fairmont and Flatwoods is at the intersection of Jesse Run, the road by my farm and I-79. It does a huge amount of business with fracking industry trucks.

All of us living now are fortunate that we have the Internet to communicate. The democratization of information which we have contrasts with former times when communication depended on newspapers, letters and personal contact. (Incidentally, democratization of information, that is, having information readily available to all, is being threatened by attempts to change the present rules by certain corporate interests.)

Now, to what I observe. Last summer, when Consol Energy bought the right to drill in Dominion’s Lost Creek Storage Field, it looked as though activity would pick up soon. Thumper Trucks went up and down the roads, finding the depth and slant of the Marcellus and there were specific locations of “the first three wells to be drilled in this area (right around Jane Lew)” in the wind. The spacings given were rational from what I knew about drilling patterns, and rights of way were specified for more locations. It looked as if the onslaught was coming.

Oil prices began to drop and voices in the wind just tapered off through the fall. I subscribe to SkyTruth Alerts, which reports new drilling permits. About the time oil hit $80 they began to drop off.

You have to understand the huge capital expenditure involved in drilling. Acquisition of land, acquisition of data (such as the information gained by thumper trucks) and location of the wells are expensive as well as the cost of the drilling rig itself, and the pipes, water and chemicals are very costly. For the drilling companies this money must be borrowed or obtained from stock sales, which in turn cost dividends instead of interest. Time is hugely important because of the cost of use of money.

Remember the old adage “fools rush in where angels fear to tread?” Shale drilling is very much an enterprise where you might come out looking brilliant (if you win), but very much the other if you lose. By this time ($46 a barrel) new permits have trickled to very few.

SkyTruth posts the coordinates of new wells permitted. This allows you to go to Google Earth and look where they would be drilled. You can fly around over the area and find well pads and pipelines in existence when the satellite pictures on which Google Earth is based were taken, a few months previously.

The permits coming out now are almost entirely on existing well pads. This means that the expense of acquisition and land preparation has been completed so the only cost is drilling the well itself. Even most of the cost of connecting the completed well is avoided, because no new long pipelines must be constructed.

The truck stop is still busy. Water trucks are rare – one assumes they are hauling away flowback water, which continues as long as the well produces. Sand trucks are still to be seen. I saw 18 in the truck stop one day around Christmas, but they seem to be thinning down two weeks later. Hauling in the sand is evidence of the actual fracking itself. Water is stockpiled, but sand must come in “just in time” as they say.

The big effort by the drilling industry now is to get the large diameter long distance pipelines built. This is an act of faith. If the price of oil stays down they are in trouble. The oversupply of gas and consequent low U. S. price of natural gas is something the frackers have done to themselves by their over-exuberance.

The excess gas supply has caused many electrical generating companies to substitute gas for coal. A few new power stations are under construction. But, existing power plants can use natural gas. They were designed to use coal by grinding it to a fine powder, which is blown into the combustion furnace. This can be turned up and down like it was gas. These plants are also equipped with gas entry into the combustion space, originally intended for temporary overload capacity (and heatup on start up). What the electricity producers have done is turn down the coal and turn up the gas. That can be done quickly.

If it can reasonably be expected, the cost of gas will stay down and new plants will be built using technology that takes gas as the primary fuel. If they use a combined cycle design it is actually more efficient (gets more electricity from the same gas) than the old coal burners, so coal is OUT FOREVER. The claims for gas to cause less global warming than coal when heat alone is used, are demonstrated false by Anthony Ingraffia, but the myth is very strong, and coal does put out contaminates in addition to carbon dioxide.

It appears the frackers are desperate to install the large diameter long distance pipelines and lock in a need for their gas. The natives are in an uproar, however. Nobody with a view reaching to the end of the pipe’s service life wants it on their property because the incendiary effects of an explosion of a 42 inch high pressure gas line are like having 2000 pound “blockbusters” dropped. And nobody wants the environmental effects of putting it in and maintaining it. I have heard that in the High Appalachian mountains it must be left exposed to the elements, rather than buried, because of the very hard rock and (relatively, don’t laugh Westerners) high altitude.

Once these pipelines are in, the electric utilities will be encouraged to build new electric generating plants dedicated to the use of gas, and the only place it can come from in volume is the Marcellus shale. Never mind the fact that when the drillers get out of the hot spots the gas will become more and more expensive, and the energy return on energy invested (EROEI) will drop well below 10, where it is now.

EROEI was over 50 in the past, and EROEI of 1 means you are putting in as much useful energy as you are taking out. The practical limit is somewhere above 5.

In effect, if the pipelines are built, all those people south of us are going to be paying for gas when they buy electricity no matter how high it gets. The only way out then is to substitute some non-conventional source, such as solar or fusion.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>

See also:  www.Appalmad.org and www.WVMatters.org

And these will go thru our Mountains?

WV-SORO Recommends Gathering Information and Letter Writing

>>> Community Meeting on Proposed Pipelines This Saturday, January 17 at Jackson’s Mill

Please join the Greenbrier River Watershed Association this Saturday, January 17 at 2PM at Jackson’s Mill (West Virginia Building) near Weston, WV for an update on the proposed Mountain Valley, Appalachian Connector and Atlantic Coast Pipelines. Lawyers from Appalachian Mountain Advocates will also be there to discuss landowner rights and answer questions from concerned community members. Please email elise@greenbrier.org or call 304-647-4792 for more information.

>>> Pipeline Company “Open Houses” Scheduled for Mountain Valley & Atlantic Coast Pipelines

Below is a schedule of upcoming “open houses” hosted by Dominion and EQT. Representatives from the pipeline companies as well as representatives from FERC (the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) will be available to answer questions from community members about the proposed pipelines.

>>> Mountain Valley Pipeline Open House Schedule

TUESDAY, JAN. 20, 2015, 5:30-8:00 pm, Summers Arena and Conference Center, 3 Armory Lane, Summersville, WV

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 21, 2015, 5:30-8:00pm, Webster Springs Municipal Building, 146 McGraw Ave., Webster Springs, WV

THURSDAY, JAN. 22, 2015, 5:30-8:00 pm, Burnsville Community Center, 237 Kanawha St., Burnsville, WV

MONDAY JAN. 26, 2015, 5:30-8:00pm, Plantation Inns and Suites, 1322 Hackers Creek Rd., Jane Lew, WV

THURSDAY, JAN. 27, 2015, 5:30-8:00 pm, Progressive Women’s Association (Old YWCA), 305 Washington Ave., Clarksburg, WV

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 28, 2015, 5:30-8:00 pm, Jacksonburg Fire Department, 93 Buffalo Run Rd., Jacksonburg, WV

>>> Atlantic Coast Pipeline Open House Schedule

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 21, 2015, 5:00-7:30 pm, Randolph County, WV, Gandy Dancer Conference Center,
359 Beverly Pike, Elkins, WV

THURSDAY, JAN. 22, 2015, 5:00-7:30 pm, Lewis County, WV, WVU Jackson’s Mill, 160 WVU Jackson Mill, Weston, VA

Who is writing for you?

>>> Contact: Julie Archer, WV Surface Owners’ Rights Organization, 1500 Dixie Street,Charleston, WV 25311 Phone: (304) 346-5891.  www.wvsoro.org

Merry FRACKmas from EQT

From the Article by Dory Hippauf, December 12, 2014

Union Township, Washington County, Pennsylvania. Population 5,600. It was the kind of place that some people might have dreamed of raising their children; the kind of place where a photo of a winter’s eve, with snow covered hills might have graced someone’s Christmas card.

For Gary Baumgardner and his wife, Union Township was that kind of place, until EQT moved in and began drilling. Quiet nights have been replaced with the sounds of fracking. The fresh air replaced with plumes of smoke and sulfuric odors.

Nine months ago, the Baumgardners celebrated the birth of their first grandchild, a little girl. The first Christmas with a first grandchild is a very special occasion. The Baumgardner family had a tradition of hosting Christmas dinner in their home surrounded by family and friends.

This year the tradition will be broken. Their nine-month old granddaughter is not permitted to be near active drilling sites per doctor’s orders, and there is an active EQT drill site next door. A number of times, Baumgardner and other residents had complained about noise and odors emanating from EQT’s well site, located on property owned by Trax Farm.

In December of 2013, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court declared unconstitutional parts of Act 13, which limited local zoning control in favor of a statewide standard guiding where natural gas wells could be drilled. Georgann and Gary Baumgardner had seen the ruling as a turning point in their struggle against EQT Corp., which began drilling in early November on nearby Trax Farm in Washington County, just over the Allegheny County line. The process has been wafting diesel fumes, noise and vibrations into their home — and seems to be consuming their lives.

One day, their bedroom air monitor flashed orange and the odor drove the family out of their Cardox Road house for hours. Another day, their daughter Rachel Cecchini, then eight months pregnant, moved out of the house next door and into a rental home several miles away — abandoning the painted nursery and her 93-year-old grandfather.

EQT has built sound walls, put residents up in hotels and offered cash settlements, while Union Township has debated the merits of residents’ complaints and the company’s efforts to address them at many public meetings since drilling began.

EQT claimed they were also frustrated and were attempting to resolve the problem. “This is not a blip on our radar,” said Linda Robertson, manager of media relations with EQT. “We have spent a lot of time and energy, and I think there are some people who have understood the attempts we’ve made.”

Ringle – Ringle, Coins when they Mingle

EQT did resolve some of the problems. EQT’s approach was not to change or improve their activities and thus stop the noise, dust, light, smoke, odors, fumes, soot or other air pollution, vibrations, and/or adverse impacts, but rather to throw money at the residents who were complaining.

EQT offered approximately 19 property owners a total of $50,000 each for signing a Noise and Nuisance Easement. (The original offer was $40,000.) In signing the Noise and Nuisance Easement, these property owners granted EQT easements for noise, dust, light, smoke, odors, fumes, soot or other air pollution, vibrations, adverse impacts or other conditions or nuisances which may emanate from EQT activities.

Additionally , the property owners gave away their rights to file any claims against EQT, agreed to being gagged. The Noise and Nuisance Easement is attached to the property forever, no matter who may own it in the future.

Baumgardner said he had attorneys review the Noise and Nuisance Easement offer and decided not to sign for fear of having his freedom of speech suppressed.

Silent Night?

At a Union Township Supervisors Meeting on December 8, 2014, Baumgardner inquired about EQT’s fracking plans for Christmas.

Would EQT stop fracking operations for Christmas?  No.

Stephanie Paluda, an EQT spokeswoman who attended the meeting, said the company will most likely continue fracking operations on Christmas. She said hydraulic fracturing started Friday, and the site is an around-the-clock operation.

For the Baumgardners, their Christmas celebration will be bittersweet. The first Christmas with their first grandchild held in the family tradition has been fracked and lost forever.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Wish EQT a Merry FRACKmas

If you, Dear Readers, would like to send a big Merry FRACKmas to EQT, contact info is below:

• EQT Facebook page
• EQT website

Corporate Headquarters: EQT eMail Contact form
EQT Corporation, EQT Plaza
625 Liberty Avenue, Suite 1700
Pittsburgh, PA 15222