Federico Pena, formerly Secretary of Energy, speaks up in Colorado

Former Secretary of Energy Speaks Out Against Fracking

From an Article by Gary Wockner, EcoWatch.com, December 8, 2014

Dear Former Secretary of Energy Federico Peña,

Thank you for speaking out against fracking, fossil fuels and climate change! I read your lengthy interview on the topic posted on the Boulder, Colorado, Daily Camera news site here. As a former U.S. Secretary of Energy, you are in a unique position to speak out and make a difference on this extremely important issue.

Former Secretary of Energy Federico Peña was interviewed by Boulder, Colorado’s Daily Camera and spoke out against fracking, fossil fuels and climate change. Photo credit: Daily Camera

However, I am compelled to point out what I believe are problems with your approach to the topic. You make two important statements in the interview that are at the center of my critique. First, you state:

“There are some who would say we shouldn’t allow fracking altogether, we shouldn’t allow any more drilling altogether, because it pollutes the air, it’s a fossil fuel, we ought to get out of it. Well, that would be terrific if we could do it in about 40 or 50 years, if we plan for it, if it’s done in a strategic and methodical fashion.”

And then about climate change, you state:

“I think as a nation and as a planet, we’re going to figure this out. And it may take a crisis, it may take some real soil erosion, it may take some coasts being wiped out around the world. It might take some parts of our country. We’ve got islands off the Florida coast that are worried about this kind of thing. But at some point I think most people will finally come to their senses and begin to take action. Now, the longer we wait, the more dramatic the action’s going to be. No question about that.”

As a climate change activist and a person who wants to protect human and non-human life on our planet, I am unwilling to accept that we have to wait to act aggressively on climate change until “coasts are being wiped out around the world.” Further, my understanding of the best available science is that we have to transition off of fossil fuels much faster than “40 or 50 years.”

I appreciate that you support Obama’s efforts so far, and the efforts of the United Nations so far, but the scientific consensus is that neither of those efforts will happen fast enough to keep coasts from being wiped out. Further, in the interview you state that the transition needs to happen more slowly:

“But if we do it in a very methodical way, so that you don’t disrupt the economy, you don’t disrupt the investments that people have made, that companies have made, there is a way for us to begin to invest in cleaner, alternative fuels over a period of years and then gradually phase out our over-dependence on fossil fuels.”

You certainly realize that “wiping out coasts” will disrupt the economy and disrupt investments? Take a look at this infographic about the social and economic costs of Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy. As one example, Katrina cost the economy $123 billion and Sandy cost $60 billion. Other hurricanes and typhoons around the planet have been even more costly in terms of human lives. Also, take a look at this document put out by the White House that indicates that a 20-year delay of action on climate change could cost the world economy between $1 trillion and $4.7 trillion.

I strongly encourage you to continue speaking out against fracking, fossil fuels and climate change. We need leaders like you who were in very powerful positions in previous administrations to be the “outside game” to push the American people and the U.S. government in the right direction. We also need leaders like you to drill down on the facts and point out actual costs to the economy and human life of inaction.

Respectfully, Gary Wockner, PhD, environmental activist.

See also:

Scientists Warn Leaders at Lima Climate Talks: Ocean Warming Drives Record Temperatures

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Fracking Quotes from Two Worlds

Quotations collected by S. Tom Bond, Resident Farmer, Lewis County, WV

There’s no reason to think there will be any adverse environmental impact,” said Matt Pitzarella of Range Resources, about a proposal that “involves the beneficial use of vertical drill cutting from natural gas wells as an aggregate in a stabilized soil pavement for construction of Marcellus and Utica Shale well pads and access roads.

“As the citizens illustrate, development of the natural gas industry in the Commonwealth unquestionably has and will have a lasting, and undeniably detrimental, impact on the quality of these core aspects [life, health, and liberty: surface and ground water, ambient air, etc.] of Pennsylvania’s environment, which are part of the public trust.” Opinion 117

“By any responsible account, the exploitation of the Marcellus Shale Formation will produce a detrimental effect on the environment, on the people, their children, and future generations, and potentially on the public purse, perhaps rivaling the environmental effects of coal extraction.” Opinion 118

Decisions of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania Middle District, December 19, 2013, concerning Act 13 — “natural resources are practically limitless” – Alec Epstein, to the Ohio Oil and Gas Association

“Making fracking safe is simply not possible, not with the prsent technology, nor with the inadequate regulations being proposed” – Louis Assstadt, former executive vice president of Mobile Oil

“Water quality is going to improve as a result of [hydrofracking]” – Tom Shepstone of Energy in Depth

“I think the positive response to the exploitation of natural gas lies in a combination of wishful thinking and intimidation “– Natural gas is not the bridge to clean energy; it’s the road to more climate change”- Naomi Oreskes. author, published by the Council of Canadian Academies

“With the return of affordable natural gas and natural gas liquids … is probably the single greatest opportunity we have to restore the middle class in America” — Peter Molinaro said at the Consumer Energy Alliance’s Pennsylvania Energy and Manufacturing Summit.

“As usual in such articles, global warming is not mentioned, and it is claimed export of LNG won’t raise prices in the U. S. The article also says photovoltaic shouldn’t get government support ‘because it is a mature technology” — This ignores the $XXXX subsidy of the hydrocarbon industries.” John Deutsch, Proessor of Chemstry at MIT and former director of energy research and Undersecretary at the U. S. Department of Energy

“There is a huge source of natural gas underneath the state parks, that is the state’s. I don’t believe in just leaving it there” — Tom Corbett, Governor of Pennsylvania

“What they sell to the American public is: ‘We don’t want dependency on foreign oil’” said former Marine Sergeant Barton. “It’s like: ‘We don’t need to be dependent on foreign oil, look what happened in Iraq. So let’s drill here.’ But they’re not [saying] that it’s the same companies, or it’s the same pockets, or the same politicians, or lobbyists. That’s the conversation no one’s having.” Barton is a worker in the Bakken fracked oil field in North Dakota.

Climate scientists say America’s oil and gas boom is having unintended consequences, not just for the climate or the local environment in energy producing regions, but for America’s global role in tackling climate change. “As we produce more, we burn more, and we send more CO2 per person into the atmosphere than almost any other country” — said Susan Brantley, geosciences professor and director of the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute at Pennsylvania State University. “We are blanketing our world with greenhouse gas, warming the planet.”

Crude Oil Supply: Saudi Arabia & US

Oil Production is in Flux.  Gas Supply is Uncertain.  Where Are The Safe Investments?

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

This graph is supposed to show the American ascendancy in oil production. The result is claimed over and over. Concealed are three important facts:

(1) The gap between the extraction cost in Saudi Arabia’s conventional oil and the US fracked oil is approximately $60/bbl. Extracting oil from shale costs $60 to $100 a barrel, compared with $25 a barrel on average for conventional supplies from the Middle East, according to the International Energy Agency [IEA]. Extreme energy extraction is just that – extremely expensive.

(2) U. S. shale drillers have to deal with high decline of production where redrilling the shales requires constant vast input of capital to keep up high production. They are on the “drilling teadmill.” Quarter by quarter they have to struggle to keep up appearances of profitability to attract capital.

(3) They are already beginning to have to deal with the fact there are “sweet spots” where production is good, but much of the drilling range is not so rewarding. They find the sweet spots in early drilling by spacing wells widely and drilling the second round adjacent to the best of the first round. Get out of the sweet spots and some wells are not even breakeven, although in the targeted shale.

You are sure to know the price of oil is down. As of this writing, $67.39 a barrel.  According to the Washington Post, down 40% since mid mid-June (then $115). Oil is a commodity, so it responds to supply and demand. It is notoriously unstable, a gambler’s dream. Storage capacity is small compared to the volume being used, so production has to go somewhere, and the price is reduced to get rid of it.

The fracking industry tells us price is down because of the increasing production of American oil. Too quick and self-serving, it is best to look for more substantial reasons, because we have not reached self sufficiency, and can’t for more than a short burst. Reserve calculations don’t factor in decline in return due to come, because of moving out of the sweet spots.

The decline in the economy world-wide is part of it – less demand. You’ve heard of the disappointment of Black Friday sales – they didn’t get as much as expected. Russia is nearing a recession. Much of Europe has trouble. Japan doesn’t seem able to pull out of recession, and China is slowing. It’s bound to have an effect, along with recent increased production by Libya, Nigeria, South Sudan, Iraq and Russia. Some think the previous high price has induced an increased efficiency of oil use, too.

All cite the decision by Saudi Arabia not to decrease production as a major part of falling prices. World consumption of oil is 85.5 million barrels per day, with Saudi Arabia contributing to it 10. 2 million a day. That’s about one-eighth world consumption. (It could pump 12.5 million, so it is already holding in, while most oil producing countries need money and pump all they can.) As a member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), the Saudi’s have a controlling interest. U. S. – Saudi relations is much too complicated to get into here, but basically the U. S. is pledged to protect the Saudi family’s hold on Arabia, in return for her control of the oil price for U. S. interests (Saudi Arabia also provides 40% of the U. S. arms production industry income. The U. S. is the largest arms producer in the world, $28B worth.)

The Saudi’s want the U. S. to wipe out Iran, their worst enemy, but Iran produces too much oil, 4.14% of the world supply. Since the U. S. is not complying, the shoe is now on the other foot. It may be that the real reason Saudi Arabia won’t turn down the production is because it is in their national interest. Here’s why.

Two things can be expected to happen if oil stays low:

(1) The other oil producing states will feel the hurt, because they need the money. If this continues for a year or more, they will be compelled to join OPEC, giving the Saudi’s much more power to raise of lower oil prices (which also effects natural gas, too).

(2) Low prices puts the fracking producers in the U. S. and elsewhere in trouble. Many of fracking companies are marginal now, because of the “fracking treadmill,” the necessity having to drill many new wells constantly to maintain production, and because of the high cost of inputs.. They have to seek new capital quarterly. If profits won’t allow repayment, the big banks will surely cut off funds and leave them swinging in the breeze.

These topics will be interesting for a long time to come. Anybody want to invest in shale?

4-H energy education project(s)

The Importance of Getting Control of Energy Supplies

By S. Tom Bond, Resident Farmer, Lewis County, WV

In the long history of civilization, some written records go back ten thousand years or so. For most people it has been almost pure calamity. A few people living isolated lives in the forest had to deal with wild animals, but people living in developed areas had to deal with human predators: both bandits and the rapacious armies traveling through; taxes to support luxury-loving aristocrats; marginal food production and failed crops. And a host of other evils most people today don’t even think about.

It seems, our time line today tends to be two or three years past and only about as far into the future. Our immediate ancestors in the United States had to take care of themselves and thus thought about the future for themselves and their heirs, taking lessons from the past. Today productive resources are assiduously gathered by a few people, and the rest depend on “jobs,” if they can find one.

Few today value the virtues of the American past, saving, efficiency, hard work, planning, etc. The job seekers want to enjoy life, and those concerned with acquisition of wealth are only interested in ever higher rates of return. Neither of these rarely think about one hundred years from now, or even ten. The world is becoming highly unstable again.

Our world is faced with a number of problems that are going to be “hard to get a handle on.” Perhaps the first among them is our dependence on energy and how we get it. You can get up a good argument that atomic weapons deserve first place, or population pressure, or that soil loss and contamination deserve first, but these all trace back to the need for energy.

Energy now comes from two reactions every eighth grader can understand. C + O2 = CO2 and 4 H + O2 = 2 H2O. The problem is two fold. First, the mineral sources of hydrocarbons, which supply the carbon and hydrogen we use for energy, are getting more difficult to obtain because what is left is further underground and more tightly held. “The easy stuff is gone,” they say. More technology and risk are required, and the return from the materials used and energy spent is less – it’s still available, but the investment is greater for the same energy return.

Second is the carbon dioxide produced. The water produced drops out of the atmosphere when it gets cool enough to condense, but the carbon dioxide does not. The atmosphere is huge, but finite. Until this generation it was large enough to be considered an infinite dump, but we are now putting out so much the atmosphere is being measurably affected, and scientists who have studied it have learned it is enough to cause world-wide heating, because carbon dioxide causes the earth to retain heat energy coming from the sun, what is called “the greenhouse effect.”

According to one source, the market capitalization of all the companies in all the sectors of the petroleum business in the United States was $4.2 trillion, 18.6% of the total market capitalization of all the publically traded, non-financial companies as of May 30, 2008. Big business indeed. And the government subsidies are equally impressive. Fuel companies are very politically powerful. 

According to an organization known as The Price of Oil (which is concerned with all fossil fuels), “Over $114 million has been paid by the oil, gas and coal industries over the last decade to buy access and influence in Congress. And the 111th Congress is turning out to be the dirtiest yet. … energy companies are reaping huge returns on their investments in Congress, to the tune of billions of dollars in subsidies each year. All while they are expanding into ever more extreme areas using unsafe tactics.”

The precautionary principle has disappeared like dew when the sun comes up. In 1998 the principle was defined thus: “When an activity raises threats of harm to human health
or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not fully established scientifically.” Where energy is concerned that has been pushed aside in the rush for economic advantage, personal wealth, and the desire for our nation to be “King of the Mountain Top,” a game we played as children.

The leaders knew there would be danger, else no need for the exemptions in the 2005 Energy Act. The $114 million mentioned above has been spent getting subsides and protection against action by aggrieved Americans. Further billions have been spent in public relations trying to burry all the complaints and the hundreds of organizations which have arisen to represent the aggrieved. The petroleum advertisements intended to suppress opposition appear everywhere.

Newspapers are bought with advertising. Universities are bought with research funds, primarily by suppressing adverse opinion and research. I heard recently one state Extension Service is subjecting 4-H campers to a fracking indoctrination in return for financial support for the camp! Propaganda for early teenagers! Petroleum and gas companies are not alone, but may be more creative than coal playing this game.

So how to insert reality into this real-life script? Just as the heat will be turned up as the earth warms and the pollution will get worse as fracking continues, the public view is changing, slowly. We need to keep working, because it is very important that energy come under control for the good of all sooner rather than later.

Shell C.E.O. Peter Voser Warns Europe to ‘Stay Competitive’

From Report by John Moylan, UK – BBC, June 6, 2013

The head of oil giant Shell has told the BBC that Europe faces a growing struggle to compete with the US economy. Royal Dutch Shell’s chief executive Peter Voser told the BBC’s John Moylan that the challenge in Europe was “to stay competitive”.

Cheap energy released by the process of fracking has revolutionised the US energy market. Gas and oil discoveries in shale rock have led to a boom in gas and oil production in recent years dramatically reducing gas prices.

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UK Shale Gas Bonanza ‘Not Assured’

From Article By Roger Harrabin, UK – BBC, April 26, 2013

Shale gas possibility: Will the UK’s energy strategy follow the US?

Shale gas in the UK could help secure domestic energy supplies but may not bring down prices, Members of Parliament (MPs) report.

The US boom in shale gas has brought energy prices tumbling and revitalised heavy industry, but the Energy and Climate Change Committee warns conditions are different in Britain.

The MPs say the UK’s shale gas developers will face technological uncertainties with different geology. And public opinion may also be more sceptical, they add. The UK is a more densely populated landscape, and shale gas operations will be closer to settlements as a consequence.

What is more, the extent of recoverable resources in the UK is also unknown, so the report concludes that it is too soon to say whether shale gas will achieve US-style levels of success.

Tony Bosworth, from Friends of the Earth, responded: “This does little to back the case for a UK shale gas revolution.”Fracking is dirty and unnecessary – it’s little wonder so many communities are in opposition. We should be building an affordable power system based on our abundant clean energy from the wind, waves and sun.”

Facing Up to Energy Addiction

By Mary Wildfire

Forty years ago, I watched a junkie shoot up. He melted some white powder in a spoon and put the liquid in a syringe, then tied a rubber cord around his arm, pulling it tight with his teeth, before injecting the contents of the syringe. I haven’t thought about it in years, but lately that image keeps coming into my mind as I observe all the happy talk about the “new” energy sources that are “making America energy-independent.”

While there have been some advances, it’s primarily the high price of conventional oil that has spurred the shale gas drilling boom, the extraction of oil from tar sands, and the big expansion in offshore drilling, including the drilling about to commence in the Arctic–ironically now available because of the global warming the oil companies deny. Together with the continuation of mountaintop removal coal mining, what all these technologies have in common is desperation… reminiscent of the desperation that drove that junkie to shoot up, despite the horrified gaze of a sixteen year old girl. He took just a small dose, just enough to “get well”… meaning to beat back the symptoms of withdrawal.

Similarly, it’s only because of the high price of conventional oil that these extreme technologies are moving forward. Given the dwindling supply of light sweet crude, and the rapidly rising demand in populous India and China, the price is unlikely to come down again for long. Fracking, drilling in deep water and the Arctic, the production and piping of tar sands oil, and mountaintop removal coal mining have high costs both in terms of bankrolling the operations, and in terms of risk—often, risk to the safety and health of the workers, but also to the environment. There seems to be broad agreement that we can deal with the threat to the environment by pretending it doesn’t exist.

It is utter madness to keep frantically pumping fossil fuels out of the ground by any means possible when we know we’re close to the threshold of catastrophic climate change — not to mention all the other harms done by drilling in the extreme environment of the Arctic, and/or under deep water. Or pumping toxic compounds mixed with millions of gallons of precious fresh water, deep underground. Or using Canada’s fresh water and natural gas to turn nasty chunks of bitumen into a sludgy compound just capable of being pumped through leaky pipes over critical aquifers to refineries thousands of miles away. Or exploding mountaintops and burying the nearby streams under the rubble.

Are we so desperate for a continuing fix of cheap fossil energy that we knowingly do such extreme damage to our only planet? Collectively, we’re pulling that rubber cord with our teeth, and bringing the needle full of filthy tar sands oil closer to the vein…

Is there no alternative? What about the clean, renewable energy sources, primarily wind and solar but potentially including a component of tidal power, geothermal and others? Why do we still get such a small percentage of our power needs from these? If we take the “externalities” into account — if we were to add all the costs of each source to the bill, including such things as buried streams, air pollution, climate change, trashed landscapes in Alberta, the health costs of those living near wells and mines, earthquakes caused by injection of fracking waste fluids, and that vague but real emotional stress felt by virtually everyone alive today as we contemplate what we’re leaving to our children — then surely the clean sources are already cheaper. Moreover, building a large number of new windmills and solar panels and installing them, along with a “smart grid” perhaps, would provide millions of badly needed new jobs. So why aren’t we doing this instead of shooting up with fossil fuels? I believe there are two reasons, one involving the decision-makers and the other the public.

For the .01% whose desires dictate to the Congress of this and other countries, what’s in that syringe is not energy so much as money. The remaining fossil fuel reserves are the asset base of the extremely wealthy and powerful oil and gas companies and those in charge are determined to wring the value out of those assets, no matter what the cost to the rest of us and our world. Thus we have the utter absurdity of continuing subsidies for oil companies, the most profitable corporations ever to exist.

For the rest of us, the situation is quite different. For most, it’s more a matter of being reluctant to accept any change in lifestyle and habits, that explains our failure to demand change. Probably, given the much lower energy density of solar and wind than fossil fuels — which represent the stored solar energy of millions of years — it isn’t realistic to expect that a largely or entirely renewable energy system would allow us to live like we do now. But is the energy-obese American lifestyle making us happy? Or secure? Or healthy?

It’s not, and to those who think life would be impossible or not worth living without expending 20 to 30 kilowatt-hours a day in our homes, plus what we use for transportation and manufacturing, I point out that our ancestors lived without any electricity at all for thousands of generations — right up to about three generations ago.

My other argument is personal. My husband and I have an off-grid solar system, which cost us $9070 (all components) in 2009. He had the skills to do this himself, saving probably $2000, but on the other hand the panels are considerably cheaper now. Tax rebates reduced the cost by about half. This system gives us all the power we need; we use about three kilowatt-hours a day, ten percent of the average US household. We have laptop computers, lights, microwave and blender, power tools, fans and a conventional refrigerator.

I don’t believe we are living in deprivation or austerity. True, we have no appliances running even when they’re off, no insecurity lights to dim the stars, no air conditioning (we built our house against tall trees to the west, so fans are ample for cooling). Thus, I believe America could use a quarter of its current electricity budget with no real loss of quality of life.

The time has come to face our addiction, and accept the withdrawal symptoms on our way to health. We can’t expect the sociopaths, i.e. people lacking in conscience and compassion, who are running our energy corporations — and through them, our governments — to lead the way. Instead, we must do it ourselves, withdrawing support from corporations and finding ways to meet our needs directly ourselves, or cooperatively in our communities, where possible.

One of the ways to do that is to set up renewable power for our homes — now, not in some vague future when, possibly, it will be cheaper than today. Thinking about ways to reduce the use of gasoline for transportation is also important. Perhaps most important is simply understanding that the privilege of using large amounts of cheap energy inefficiently was a twentieth century phenomenon, and it’s about over now.

Are we ready to accept grownup responsibility, to live in touch with the changing weather conditions, to live as citizens of Earth and not its owners? We need to leave much of the remaining fossil fuel in the ground, and move rapidly to a leaner, greener, cleaner way of life. It will require more thoughtfulness, sometimes more labor-intensive ways of doing things (in other words, more jobs) and sometimes foregoing things when the power supply is low.

Let’s put down that needle, that pipeline, and that drilling rig, stop talking about fossil fuels as “bridges to a clean energy future” and just move directly to that future now. Leaving a decent planet for our grandchildren depends upon it.

>>> Mary Wildfire has lived near Spencer, the county seat of Roane County, WV, most of the last 35 years. She is active in community projects, a member of the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition and a resident of the Hickory Ridge Land Trust. <<<