Fracking waste disposal in Guernsey County, OH. (These activities are known risks of creating earthquakes.)

Environmental Essay by Lisa C. Lieb, Revelator Voices, March 27, 2023

Let’s Protect This Place: A region historically plagued by industrial pollution is overwhelmed with unconventional oil and gas development. The Allegheny Plateau is a lower-lying portion of the Appalachian Mountain Range that extends from southern and central New York to northern and western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, northern and western West Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.

Why it matters: The plateau consists of areas of gently sloping hills in the north and west of the region as well as rugged valleys in the south and east. It overlies the Marcellus Shale and Utica Shale, sedimentary rock formations. The region is rich in natural resources, including hardwoods, iron ore, silica, coal, oil and natural gas.

The abundance of these resources supported development in the region and were integral to the local steel, glass, rail and extraction industries.

Prior to widespread logging between 1890 and 1920, the area hosted old-growth forests containing red spruce, eastern white pine, eastern hemlock, sugar maple, black oak, white oak, yellow birch and American beech.

But the forest’s makeup is now different, favoring oaks, maples, hickories, American beech and yellow birch. Though fragmented and much less mature than the old-growth forests, today’s forests continue to play a vital role in ecosystems, serving as habitats for the federally endangered Indiana bat as well as locally endangered or at-risk species such as little brown bats, northern flying squirrels and blackpoll warblers.

The region hosts the Ohio River watershed and confluence, the Allegheny National Forest in New York and Pennsylvania, and the Wayne National Forest in Ohio.

The threat: Unconventional oil and gas development has boomed in the region over the past decade. The U.S. Geological Survey estimates that the Marcellus and Utica shale plays contain approximately 214 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas, making the Allegheny Plateau a lucrative location for hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”

Already more than 13,000 unconventional wells have been drilled in Pennsylvania. Fracking itself is a resource intense process, requiring between 2 and 20 million gallons of water per well. A 2014 study estimated that in Pennsylvania, 80% of the water used for fracking comes from streams, rivers, and lakes, thus potentially altering water temperature and levels of dissolved oxygen. This water is combined with sand and a mixture of hazardous chemicals, which may include methanol, ethylene glycol and propargyl alcohol.

Between 20-25% of the water that is injected into the well returns to the surface. This flowback water often has higher salinity and has been known to contain barium, arsenic, benzene and radium. While recycling of flowback is becoming more common, other methods of disposal include underground injection, application to road surfaces, treatment at public waste facilities, and discharging it onto rivers, streams and lakes.

Near fracking sites in West Virginia, elevated levels of barium and strontium were found in feathers of Louisiana waterthrushes, native songbirds who make their home in brooks and wooded swamps. In northwestern Pennsylvania, crayfish and brook trout living in fracked streams were found to have increased levels of mercury. Fish diversity is also reduced in streams that have been fracked.

Fracking consumes land, too. Each fracking well requires 3-7 acres. In Pennsylvania over 700,000 acres of state forest land are leased or available for gas production. Well pads, pipelines and other fracking infrastructure fragment forests, alter their ecology, and reduce biodiversity. Appalachian azure butterflies and federally threatened northern wild monkshood — purple-flowering herbaceous perennials found in New York and Ohio — are both sensitive to forest fragmentation.

In addition to the direct impacts of fracking, the availability of natural gas in the Marcellus and Utica shale plays attracts petrochemical development to the region. Shell Polymers Monaca initiated operations in November 2022 at a newly constructed 386-acre petrochemical complex in southwestern Pennsylvania, along the Ohio River.

The plant manufactures virgin polyethylene pellets, which will be largely be used for production of single-use plastic products. In addition to releasing hazardous air pollutants, volatile organic compounds and particulate matter, this ethane “cracker” plant will emit 2.2 million tons of carbon dioxide per year.

The plant’s existence will also fuel fracking in the region; it is anticipated that it will require between 100 and 200 new wells each year in order to supply natural gas for its productions. Other petrochemical companies, including Exxon, PTT Global and Odebrecht, have reportedly been considering building similar complexes in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia.

My place in this place: I was born and raised in the area, and my family’s roots in southwestern Pennsylvania go back several generations. Some of my most cherished memories involve Pennsylvania’s forests, rivers and streams. As a child I loved my family’s summer pilgrimages to our cabin, a rustic building that had been converted from a one-room schoolhouse in the Pennsylvania Wilds. At “camp” we fished for yellow perch, smallmouth bass and walleye in the Sinnemahoning Creek and caught crayfish by hand. We sunned ourselves on the rocks along the river bank when the water was warm. In the evenings we walked on quiet, narrow roads in hopes of spotting an eastern elk in a grassy field.

I now live in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, one mile from the Shell cracker plant. I can observe the plant’s flaring from my kitchen window, which often creates an ominous orange glow in the night sky. To me the plant doesn’t symbolize job creation or a rebounding local economy, despite the assertions of local and state politicians. I see the plant as the perpetuation of a hopeless dependence on fossil fuels and corporate profit at the expense of ecological integrity. I worry that fracking and an associated petrochemical buildout will destroy already fragile ecosystems throughout my home in the Allegheny Plateau.

Who’s protecting it now: There are a variety of environmental groups located in the region. No Petro PA is an organization that resists fracking and pipeline development in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia. More locally the Beaver County Marcellus Awareness Community in western Pennsylvania opposes fracking and seeks to protect local community members from its harmful effects.

With the rise of the Shell cracker plant, the group also formed Eyes on Shell, a community organization that aims to hold Shell accountable for its activity and advocates for the surrounding communities’ health and safety. These are just three of the many grassroots organizations working to protect the air, soil, water, wildlife and communities in the region.

The national organization, FracTracker, also provides extensive data on oil and natural gas wells, pipelines, legislation and environmental health.

What this place needs: Ideally Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia will follow in the footsteps of New York and institute a ban on fracking in light of the environmental and health risks associated with unconventional gas and oil development. However, given their strong ties to the fossil fuel industry, it is unlikely that this will occur. Banning fracking on public land in the region, such as in state forests and county parks, in a practical first step in combatting forest fragmentation and pollution.

At a regional level, regulations should be put in place to protect the water quality of the Ohio River. The Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission, a multistate organization working with the federal government, could ban fracking in the Ohio River Basin in order to protect the river and its watershed. The Delaware River Basin Commission has successfully prohibited fracking within the Delaware River Basin; the rules developed by the commission could be adapted for use by the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission.

Additional government oversight would help to protect water quality in the region. Presently fracking is exempt from the Safe Water Drinking Act and therefore isn’t regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Ending this exemption could increase water quality and safety within the Allegheny Plateau.

Increased transparency from oil and gas companies is also required to protect the region’s water. As of July 2022, California is the only state in the country that requires full public disclosure of all chemicals used in fracking. Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio must implement policies that require full public disclosure of chemicals used in all phases of the fracking process.

Will a push for plastics turn Appalachia into next ‘Cancer Alley’?

From an Article by Emily Holden, The Guardian, October 11, 2019

Critics say ethane expansion will not only prolong fracking but could also trigger a public health disaster.

Construction cranes climb into the sky and sprawl across the massive petrochemical facility that will turn a byproduct of fracked gas into plastic on the banks of the Ohio River, just outside Pittsburgh. Even at a distance, from the car park of a cancer treatment centre on a nearby hilltop, Royal Dutch Shell’s 386-acre site is a behemoth. It will anchor yet more gas, plastics and chemicals infrastructure in the tristate region of Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia.

The plant would solidify demand for fracked natural gas and the ethane that comes with it out of the ground. It would make 1.6m tons of plastic and 2.2m tons of globe-heating carbon dioxide annually – roughly the same amount the city of Pittsburgh is trying to eliminate. The facility would also release hundreds of tons of toxic compounds into the air.

As global demand for plastics grows, the buildout of this industry threatens US progress on the climate crisis and clean air.

Opponents say the vast plastics industry will prolong fracking, even after power companies shift further towards renewable power, such as solar and wind. “To me, it’s so obvious that they are trying to lock us into fossil fuels,” said Terrie Baumgardner, a member of the Beaver County Marcellus Awareness Community.

At a time when scientists warn humans must stop pulling fossil fuels out of the ground and spewing plastics into the environment, natural gas drilling is booming in Appalachia and the ethane-to-plastics industry there is just getting started.

In a tall office building on a hazy Pittsburgh day, Matt Mehalik, the executive director of a public health collaboration called the Breathe Project, slammed his hand on a table. “This region has been down this path before and we should know better,” he said. “I grew up in Pittsburgh at the time the steel industry unravelled. It has taken 30 years to recover.”

Dangerous air is already present and more coming

Opposed residents have myriad concerns. The Shell ethane facility, or “cracker” plant, would use extreme heat to turn ethane into ethylene, which becomes the polyethylene in plastic bottles, bags and food packaging. It will be fed by thousands of fracking wells that dot local communities, including next to day-care facilities and school bus stops.

Pipelines run under neighbourhoods that have previously been affected by explosions and fires. Trucks overwhelm the roads.

Residents opposing the ever-growing expansion say they worry about illnesses and dozens of cases of rare cancers they never saw in generations past.

Pittsburgh already has some of the most dangerous air in America. The city received a double-F rating from the American Lung Association for smog and particle pollution from fossil fuels. And Allegheny County, which includes Pittsburgh, has ranked in the top 2% for cancer risks from air pollution.

And a report by the Conservation Voters of Pennsylvania last year found that since 2007, companies profiting from fracking had spent nearly $70m lobbying the state government, in part to insist the method was safe.

“Fracking money has undermined the voice of the people in comparison to the voice of the desire for fracking in the region,” said Mark Dixon, a film-maker and activist.

The pro-business group the Allegheny Conference on Community Development has boasted the plastics boom could turn Appalachia into a petrochemical hub similar to the Gulf Coast. But there, Louisiana residents have long tried to draw attention to the stretch of communities between New Orleans and Baton Rouge known as “Cancer Alley”.

The conference argues its goal is to attract business and that government regulators are responsible for keeping residents healthy. A spokesman, Philip Cynar, said: “We have to think about the holistic approach … we can do a lot more for the overall benefit of the region if we have a good economy.”

The fear of health risks is misplaced, according to Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. In consultation with US regulators, it approved Shell’s air pollution plan in 2015. Allegheny County’s health department considered the effects of the plant’s releases of benzene, toluene, hexane, formaldehyde and ammonia – which cause cancer and other serious health problems. The department found the levels would be “well below the health-based risk value” for an individual.

Shell has said it designed the facility to “obtain the lowest achievable emissions.”

Aside from air pollution, the Shell plant will be as bad for global heating as putting a further 424,000 cars on the road each year. “It’s a huge paradox,” said Grant Ervin, Pittsburgh’s chief resilience officer. Oil and gas jobs pay well, even for people straight out of high school, he said. But the climate crisis puts humans “at the precipice of a public health disaster.”

Job creation has been a priority

Republicans and Democrats have supported the Shell plant, saying it will bring work to an area that has been hit hard by a downturn in US-made steel and coal.

Shell says it will create 6,000 construction jobs in the short term and 600 over the longer term. It is unclear exactly how many will go to locals. State lawmakers offered the company a $1.65bn, 25-year tax cut, the biggest break in Pennsylvania history.

Republican legislators have proposed a package of bills to encourage the natural gas industry, including by speeding the process for permitting projects and providing huge financial incentives.

Pennsylvania’s governor, the Democrat Tom Wolf, inherited the project from a Republican predecessor and now supports it.

But the facility and others like it are antithetical to Wolf’s plans to shrink the climate footprint of Pennsylvania, the country’s fourth-largest emitter of carbon dioxide. He wants to cut carbon pollution in Pennsylvania 26% by 2025, and 80% by 2050. His Department of Environmental Protection said the state is requiring the plant to reduce its climate footprint as possible “to help ensure that economic development and environmental protection can go hand in hand.”

Pittsburgh’s mayor, the Democrat Bill Peduto, famously challenged Trump on climate change, saying Pittsburgh would abide by an international pledge to limit heat-trapping pollution, even if Trump would not. But Peduto has stayed silent about the plant.

Construction continues (temporary stop work underway)

Hailed by Barack Obama as a “bridge fuel”, natural gas has become a nightmare for climate advocates. It has spurred a transition from coal, which emits twice as much carbon dioxide. But the bridge does not seem to be ending, and the natural gas production process leaks methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

The industry has continued to build wells, plants and pipelines – about 27% of natural gas in the US comes from the Marcellus and Utica shales under Appalachia. By 2040, the area will produce 37% of the country’s natural gas, according to the data firm IHS Markit.

Appalachia has wet gas, meaning it produces both the methane mixture that is used for power and stovetops and natural gas liquids, including ethane and propane. Drillers want a local market at which to sell them all.

Of the Democratic frontrunners for president, senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders have pledged to ban fracking. Joe Biden, the former vice-president, has not. But the Trump administration is supporting the build-out.

Ken Humphreys, a senior adviser for regional economic development at the US Department of Energy, said: “Broadly this is about creating the conditions for private capital to flow into the region.

Between 2018 and 2040, the US’s capacity for making ethylene and intermediate petrochemical products is expected to nearly double. The energy department argues that global demand for plastic is rising, and it will either be produced in the US or in countries with more lax environmental standards.

Humphreys said there were 7,500 businesses within 300 miles of Pittsburgh, employing 900,000 people to make products that incorporated petrochemicals – most of which came from the Gulf Coast. Producing plastic locally would be more efficient, the department said.

Rare cancers in southwestern Pennsylvania

In Washington County, Pennsylvania, south-west of Pittsburgh, fracking well pads sit alongside neighbourhoods. One, called a super-frack pad because of its dozens of wellheads, sits in a valley next to the former coal community of Marianna.

A school bus stop overlooks the site and the children who wait there each morning live in brick homes that were built for coalminers and then abandoned.

Four counties in south-western Pennsylvania have been afflicted by a rash of rare cancers, including 27 cases of Ewing sarcoma over 10 years in a population of about 750,000. The bone cancer usually occurs in children and young adults.

A retired paediatrician, Ned Ketyer, said: “Ewing sarcoma is a nightmare for the families that are given that diagnosis, and certainly for the patients and also for the physicians that diagnose it. It starts very quietly but by the time the diagnosis is made it has deepened and spread.”

There are dozens of other rare cancer cases in the area too. The Pennsylvania Department of Health studied rates of the disease in two school districts and said there was no evidence of a cluster.

But people are still worried. Last week, 50 environmental advocacy and public health groups as well as hundreds of individuals signed a letter to the Pennsylvania governor asking him to attend a public meeting to hear their health concerns. The state’s epidemiologist attended instead.

The region has a toxic legacy that predates natural gas – including hundreds of years of coal-mining and agriculture pesticide use. But Ketyer said the cancers did not begin until fracking arrived.

Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection found the Shell plant’s hazardous air pollutants–which cause cancer and other serious sicknesses–“will not threaten public health and safety,” spokesman Neil Shader said.

Residents also worry about gas industry accidents. One September morning in 2018, Karen Gdula awoke to an explosion and flames shooting into the air from a 24-inch pipeline buried a few houses away. Her neighbours narrowly escaped with several of their dogs, but they lost their home, another dog and four cats in the fire.

Another neighbour, who was celebrating her birthday, had trouble convincing an emergency services operator that the pipeline had exploded until the operator heard the fire roar. The flames were so hot they melted a nearby transmission tower.

A second pipeline is under construction that will cross over the one that exploded. Gdula has been working with the construction company to make it safer for the neighbourhood. “My goal is safety,” she said. “We don’t believe we can stop them but we can do what we can to be safe.”

Global climate change

Natural gas from shale – the type that is extracted with fracking – is expected to double in the US in the coming decades, mostly in the east, according to the US Energy Information Administration. And the energy department expects an enormous 20-fold surge in ethane production in the eastern US by 2025.

Scientists say to avoid catastrophe from rising temperatures, people must rapidly reduce their emissions from fossil fuels to net zero by 2050.

The world is already 1C hotter than before industrialisation, and it is on track to warm an additional 2C – worsening extreme weather and poverty and leading to rapidly rising seas.

The Center for International Environmental Law, a pro-environment group, estimates that by 2050 climate-harming emissions from the production and incineration of plastics could reach 56 gigatons per year, or 10-13% of the budget allowed for keeping temperatures from rising more than 1.5C.

There is no way of knowing how much a plastics hub in Appalachia will exacerbate global warming and offset the work of states and cities trying to cut heat-trapping emissions. The ethane boom will, however, stretch beyond western Pennsylvania into Ohio and West Virginia.

In nearby Barnesville, Jill Hunkler said she was driven from her home by fracking. As gas wells were constructed around her, Hunkler said she started to experience headaches, breathing problems, burning eyes and a metallic taste in her mouth.

Hunkler counts 78 producing wells within five miles of her house, according to data from FracTracker. “There’s just no respect for the local community’s health,” she claimed.

Bev Reed, a nursing graduate and intern at the Sierra Club, a grassroots environmental organisation, said the community had no say over whether the facility was built.

“We already know it’s not sustainable and that Appalachia has been pillaged and plundered and raped for pretty much as long as its existed,” Reed said. “We’ve seen enough and we deserve better.”

…… Support the Guardian newspaper for its detailed investigative reporting, as it only takes a minute. Thank you.

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See also: The Ohio River Defines the Borders of Five States—But Its Pollution Doesn’t Stop at State Lines, Susan Cosier, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), August 21, 2019

In a move that could open the door to industrial waste and interstate squabbles, the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission is making its water quality standards voluntary.

[The Ohio River consistently is ranked as the most polluted in the country, with an estimated 30 million pounds of toxic chemicals illegally dumped into its waters each year.] dgn

Farm shown near Marathon’s cryogenic separation plant at Chartiers, Washington, PA

From an Article by Don Hopey & David Templeton, Pittsburgh Post Gazette, 6/17/19

More than 100 organizations and 800 individuals have signed a public letter to Gov. Tom Wolf calling on him to direct the state Department of Health to investigate potential links between shale gas development and a proliferation of childhood cancers.

The letter, which environmental groups plan to deliver to the governor and state Health Department Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine via email Monday, and hand deliver during a demonstration in Harrisburg Wednesday, also requests that all new shale gas permitting be suspended until the health investigation can demonstrate the cancers are not linked to shale gas drilling and fracking operations.

“This is a public health crisis that requires immediate and significant action,” according to the text of the four-page letter.

Emily Wurth helped lead the letter-writing effort and said the broad-based support for examination of health impacts of shale gas development was prompted by the ongoing Pittsburgh Post-Gazette series “Human toll: Risk and exposure in the gas lands.”

Why are there high numbers of childhood cancers in southwestern Pennsylvania?

Stories in the Post-Gazette series document up to 67 cases of childhood and young adult cancers in Washington, Greene, Fayette and Westmoreland counties where shale gas operations are active. The total includes 27 cases of Ewing sarcoma, a rare bone cancer.

“The letter references the investigative reporting and scientific evidence that strongly suggests a link between childhood cancers and shale gas operations,” said Ms. Wurth, who is organizing co-director of Food & Water Watch and Food & Water Action. “We organized this strong response in just a couple of weeks from the about 125 organizations and even more individuals who are concerned about what they’ve read.”

A state health department review of 12 Ewing sarcoma cases in Westmoreland County and six in Canon-McMillan School District in Washington County failed to conclude that either met the criteria for designation as a “cancer cluster.” The study only included three of the six Canon-McMillan area cases in the cluster assessment.

The shale gas industry has vigorously denied there is any link between human health impacts and the air and water pollutants emitted by its widespread and expanding drilling, fracking, processing and transport operations.

Marcellus Shale Coalition President David Spigelmyer said in written responses to questions: “We are disappointed that some activists choose to sensationalize tragedy, make inflammatory suggestions that run counter to the views of respected medical experts, top environmental and health regulators and decades of scientific data and research.”

He said the industry is committed to protecting and enhancing the health and safety of the environment and communities where it operates.

Raina Ripple, director of the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project, a Washington County nonprofit that does educational outreach about the health impacts of shale gas drilling, said the multiple childhood cancers focus public concern and present an opportunity to press public officials for answers.

“This is a moment in time to raise these concerns about our children’s health and the cancer rate, and we feel the governor would be remiss in not addressing these concerns,” Ms. Ripple said.

She said there are still significant questions about what is spiking the cancer rates and noted multiple factors may be contributing to that problem, including genetics, legacy pollution and radiation sites, lifestyle factors and environmental exposures.

“But what is new in the last five or 10 years that could have triggered this?” Ms. Ripple said. “Many in the community are quick to seize on legacy causes like radioactive waste but something has changed. The indices of childhood cancer are out of whack. And what’s changed, what’s new, is the shale gas industry.”

The letter notes that about 12,000 wells have been drilled and fracked in the four mostly rural southwestern Pennsylvania counties in the last 15 years, bringing in a host of toxic chemicals, many of them known carcinogens.

Many of those chemicals pose a high risk to children and at-risk populations, the letter states. It also notes there are numerous peer-reviewed public health studies that have found an association between shale gas drilling and fracking and low birth weights in babies, birth defects, asthma and other respiratory problems.

Scientific associations don’t prove that those health impacts are linked to shale gas development activities, but they could be, and should be the subject of more scientific study, said Sandra Steingraber, a biologist at Ithaca College and founder of Concerned Health Professionals of NY.

“We may be on the leading edge of what could be a real cancer crisis in the shale gas drilling and fracking industry,” said Ms. Steingraber, noting studies showing high levels of benzene, a known carcinogen, in the urine of gas well workers, and another that found children living within 500 feet of gas wells in Colorado have higher rates of leukemia.

The letter to the governor notes a Yale study that identified at least 55 fracking chemicals as known or possible carcinogens and recommends further research into the relationship between shale gas development and the “risk of cancer in general and childhood leukemia in particular.”

“As a biologist, what I see so far is little arrows pointing in a direction, arrows that say, ‘Dig here,’” Ms. Steingraber said.

“Based on its air and water emissions, we should look at the role of the drilling and fracking industry,” she said. “Those are reasonable questions to ask.”

Among the organizations signing the letter are Allegheny County Clean Air Now; Climate Reality Project: Pittsburgh & SWPA chapter; Thomas Merton Center EcoJustice Working Group; Green Party of Allegheny County; Allegheny County Chapter of the Izaak Walton League of America; Marcellus Outreach Butler; PennEnvironment; Pennsylvania Council of Churches; Physicians for Social Responsibility-Pennsylvania; and the Sisters of St. Joseph of Baden, Beaver County.

In addition to Ms. Steingraber, other notable individuals signing the letter include actors Mark Ruffalo and Shailene Woodley, “Gasland” documentary filmmaker Josh Fox, and Bill McKibben, founder of the climate change focused 350.org. State legislators signed on include Reps Chris Rabb, D-Philadelphia; Rep. Danielle Friel Otten, D-Chester; Elizabeth Fiedler, D-Philadelphia; Sara Innamorato, D-Lawrenceville; and Summer Lee, D-Swissvale.

“We’ve been seeing different challenges to the investment this state has been making in shale gas development and fracking,” said Ms. Otten, whose district doesn’t have drilling but does have pipelines and pumping stations. “It’s beyond time to take a pause, a breath, to ensure that we’re moving Pennsylvania in the right direction and upholding our statutory responsibilities in ensuring public health and safety.”

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See Also: Industry criticizes ‘ridiculous’ request to halt shale gas drilling, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, June 18, 2019

1. The Marcellus Shale Coalition is asking Gov. Tom Wolf “to reject the ridiculous request” to shut down shale gas development in southwestern Pennsylvania until the state determines whether its pollutants are linked with childhood cancer.

2. The Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project will host a “Community Meeting on Childhood Cancers in SW PA,” including Canon-McMillan cancers, from 6 to 8 p.m. Tuesday 6/18/19 at Bella Sera, 414 Morganza Road, North Strabane, Washington County.

Chernobyl Unit 4 in 1986 explosion damage contaminated the region

From an Article by Grant Smith, Environmental Working Group, May 22, 2019

From 2009 to 2012, Gregory Jaczko was chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which approves nuclear power plant designs and sets safety standards for plants. But he now says that nuclear power is too dangerous and expensive – and not part of the answer to the climate crisis.

“Nuclear power was supposed to save the planet,” Jaczko wrote in a recent op-ed for The Washington Post. As an atomic physicist, he once endorsed that view. But his years on the NRC ­changed his mind:

This tech is no longer a viable strategy for dealing with climate change, nor is it a competitive source of power. It is hazardous, expensive and unreliable, and abandoning it wouldn’t bring on climate doom. The real choice now is between saving the planet and saving the dying nuclear industry. I vote for the planet.

Jaczko describes how his experience revealed the pervasive political influence of the nuclear power industry in Congress and among his fellow commissioners. Their opposition derailed much of the safety measures he proposed in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan. In 2011 an investigative series by The Associated Press detailed the collusion between regulators and the industry to weaken safety standards to keep existing plants economically viable.

Jaczko’s efforts to protect the American public likely cost him his career at the NRC. He now leads an offshore wind power startup and is speaking out at an important juncture for the nation’s energy future.

Electric utilities that operate nuclear plants are boasting of being “carbon free” by mid-century. They insist that their aging nuclear plants must be part of the equation to keep costs down. But even though Japan closed most of its reactors after Fukushima, carbon emissions went down, because the Japanese ramped up energy efficiency and solar investments.

“It turns out that relying on nuclear energy is actually a bad strategy for combating climate change,” Jaczko wrote. “One accident wiped out Japan’s carbon gains. Only a turn to renewables and conservation brought the country back on target.”

Jaczko’s heightened concern for a nuclear accident in the U.S. is also well founded. The former director of the nuclear safety project at Union of Concern Scientists, David Lochbaum, determined that the industry’s efforts to continue to run aging nuclear plants 20 to 30 years or even longer than their initial licenses allowed for is akin to playing Russian roulette.

Since Fukushima, Germany has ordered the shutdown of all nuclear plants by 2022. Japan has reopened only a few reactors. Even France, long a champion of nuclear power, is ramping down its nuclear fleet because of safety concerns. But in the U.S., the Trump administration and lawmakers in some states continue to support taxpayer-financed subsidies to bail out money-losing nuclear plants. On grounds of both economics and safety, that’s a fool’s bet.

Radioactive Radium Leaches from Black Shale During Fracking

From a Press Release, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, September 18, 2018

Radioactivity in fracking wastewater comes from the interaction between a chemical slurry and ancient shale during the hydraulic fracturing process, according to Dartmouth College research.

The study, detailed in twin papers appearing in Chemical Geology, is the first research that characterizes the phenomenon of radium transfer in the widely-used method to extract oil and gas. The findings add to what is already generally known about the mechanisms of radium release and could help the search for solutions to challenges in the fracking industry.

As a result of fracking, the U.S. is already a net exporter of gas and is poised to become a net exporter of oil in the next few years. But the wastewater that is produced contains toxins like barium and radioactive radium. Upon decay, radium releases a cascade of other elements, such as radon, that collectively generate high radioactivity.

“The stuff that comes out when you frack is extremely salty and full of nasties,” said Mukul Sharma, a professor of earth sciences at Dartmouth and head of the research project. “The question is how did the waste become radioactive? This study gives a detailed description of that process.”

During fracking, millions of gallons of water combined with sand and a mixture of chemicals are pumped deep underground at high pressure. The pressurized water breaks apart the shale and forces out natural gas and oil. While the sand prevents the fractures from resealing, a large proportion of the so-called “slick water” that is injected into the ground returns to the surface as highly toxic waste.

In seeking to discover how radium is released at fracking sites, the research team combined sequential and serial extraction experiments to leach radium isotopes from shale drill core samples. For the study, the research team focused on rocks taken from Pennsylvania and New York locations of the Marcellus Shale. The geological feature is one of the major rock formations in the U.S. where fracking is being carried out to extract natural gas.

The first research paper found that radium present in the Marcellus Shale is leached into saline water in just hours to days after contact between rock and water are made. The leachable radium within the rock comes from two distinct sources, clay minerals that transfer highly radioactive radium-228, and an organic phase that serves as the source of the more abundant isotope radium-226.

The second study describes the radium transfer mechanics by combining experimental results and isotope mixing models with direct observations of radium present in wastewaters that have resulted from fracking in the Marcellus Shale.

Taken together, the two papers show that the increasing salinity in water produced during fracking draws radium from the fractured rock. Prior to the Dartmouth study, researchers were uncertain if the radioactive radium came directly from the shale or from naturally-occurring brines present at depth in parts of the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania.

“Interaction between water and rock that occurs kilometers below the land surface is very difficult to investigate,” said Joshua Landis, a senior research scientist at Dartmouth and lead author for the research papers. “Our measurements of radium isotopes provide new insights into this problem.”

The research confirms that as wastewater travels through the fracture network and returns to the fracking drill hole, it becomes progressively enriched in salts. The highly-saline composition of the wastewater is responsible for extracting radium from the shale and for bringing it to the surface.

“Radium is sitting on mineral and organic surfaces within the fracking site waiting to be dislodged. When water with the right salinity comes by, it takes on the radioactivity and transports it,” said Sharma.

The Dartmouth findings come as oil and natural gas production in the U.S. have increased dramatically over the past decade due to fracking. Understanding the mechanics of radium transfer during fracking could help researchers develop strategies to mitigate wastewater production.

“The science is being left behind by the gold rush,” said Sharma. “Getting the science is the first step to fixing the problem.”

An earlier Dartmouth study, found that the metal barium reacts to fracking processes in similar ways. Radium and barium are both part of the same group of alkaline earth metals.

Antero Water Treatment Plant & Waste Dump

Letter from Barbara Daniels, Nicholas County, WV, August 4, 2014

With three high-priced lawyers and an imported team of experts, Antero Resources LLC and the WV DEP recently steam-rolled over a one-man appeal to temporarily stop construction of a 447-acre frack-waste dump in Doddridge County at the Ritchie border.

WV Mountain Party Environmental Justice Committee member, Tom Rhule, had compiled an extensive roster of damning facts, complete with subpoenas for WV officials and their documents. However, though accepting Antero’s experts, the Environmental Quality Board quashed Rhules’s subpoenas, saying there would be plenty of time for his witnesses at the September permit hearing–after the dump was fully operational.

Antero claims this facility will solve a problem Antero causes. Every time a natural gas well is horizontally hydrofractured, millions of gallons of toxic, radioactive waste are produced. Each well is fracked up to ten times in 20 years, with as many as 24 wells per pad. The water for this is typically drawn from local rivers and streams.

Where the water goes after it’s thus been poisoned is a major problem. Although Antero’s fracking operations have ruined numerous water wells in Doddridge County, the facility will purify waste water only enough for reuse in fracking. It will pollute every fresh water source it contacts.

Moreover, Antero proposes to transport the resulting radioactive waste to an out of state licensed facility. Yet that company has never been required to either transport or pay for proper disposal of radioactive sludge before. So proper enforcement is extremely suspect. The WV DEP has a history of letting frackers dangerously cut corners, especially for radioactive frack waste disposal.

Some 98% of the toxic portion will be landfilled as “salts” at the unbelievable rate of up to 2100 TONS EVERY DAY FOR 25 YEARS. At that rate, with Antero’s claimed 2% of chemical compounds still in the salt, this landfill will eventually be a hazard for taxpayers to deal with. Frack-waste is exempt from all federal environmental protections, including the Superfund law, and the permit requires no pollution controls for leaching and runoff after Antero leaves.

Further, the WV DEP permit in question does not require Antero to monitor for the most cancer-causing toxins associated with frack waste, either in its landfill leachate OR its recycled fluids. In fact, The WV DEP’s monitoring methods fail to even come close to adequately testing for the carcinogenic, mutagenic, and teratogenic toxins common to frack waste from either the “Clearwater” industrial fluid recycling center or the landfill.

The most alarming part of this dump, however, may be the pits. The landfill will occupy 134 acres. Although the permit doesn’t tell us, after buildings and such, about 250 acres should be left. Are these covered with sludge pits? Antero is receiving an average of 600 tanker-loads of waste daily and settling the solids in these pits is the first step.

As the pits fill, this vast area will begin emitting enormous, cancer-causing plumes of toxins that spread everywhere. According to a University of Maryland study, such frack-related clouds have reached communities hundreds of miles away.

The stay of the Antero construction permit was denied by the WV Environmental Quality Board July 21. Mr. Rhule had given ample reasons for personal harm and his access to evidence was barred by the Board. Nevertheless, the EQB grounds for denial were that he would not be harmed, and that he failed to supply adequate evidence!

Antero’s stated reasons for denial were: 1. They would lose millions already invested in construction, brazenly assuming that their money is worth more than lives, 2. The construction itself would not harm Rhule — which in essence denies that a toxic-waste dump harms taxpayers.

Large corporations obviously have far too much control over West Virginia regulators. But we have the power to change this if informed. The hearing on the permit is scheduled for September 14 at the EQB courtroom, 601 57th St. (Kanahwa City) in Charleston. Rhule, the WV Rivers Coalition and Lissa Lucas (candidate-WV House) will be separately challenging this extremely dangerous permit. You are invited.

Compressor station noise, blow-down, leaks & odors are issues!

Commentary on Fracking in Maryland

[Garrett County already has a huge natural gas storage field at Accident, MD]

In 2007 I was part of a team at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) who reviewed $37 billion-dollar-plus programs.  We were trying to understand why so many DHS programs were failing.  As part of the review we’d have the program principals come in and we’d ask them questions about their program.  The last question was, “What do you want to buy?”  Remember these men and women had their hands out asking for hundreds of millions of dollars.  Many of them couldn’t answer the question.  They wanted the money but didn’t know how they were going to spend it.  They hadn’t done their homework.  Their approach from an engineering perspective was irresponsible.

On Tuesday, December 6^th, I went to the Pre-Legislative meeting in Garrett County.  I asked Delegate Bieztel and Senator Edwards some very basic questions about fracking, which they have supported since the O&G industry became interested in Maryland.  Since then our representatives have been claiming significant economic benefits which would result from fracking.

I asked them to tell me what the economic impact to the county would be especially to the average household.  They couldn’t give me any numbers.  Delegate Beitzel proceeded to tell me how to figure the amount of money land lessors could expect.

I asked them for the number, type, and duration of the jobs that we could expect and whether these jobs would be filled locally or not.  They couldn’t answer those questions except to say one had to make assumptions about lots of things.  I suppose they were telling me that it was hard to derive those numbers.  Maybe so, but if you’re asking people to support a risky proposition you should have done enough analysis to understand the basics.  I also asked them if they would require O&G companies to staff fracking operations with union workers since unions were very careful to protect the well-being (safety) of employees whereas fracking operators are not.  Fracking workers are seven times more likely to die on the job than on other type jobs according to the AFL-CIO.  Our representatives said they would not support a requirement for fracking operators to hire union workers.

The bottom line for me is our representatives are asking us to support fracking and its associated risks (costs) because of the benefits, and yet they don’t know what the benefits really are.  They are asking the average household to buy-in to their ideas without any idea how the average household will benefit.  That is, they want us all to assume the economic, health, and environmental risks associated with fracking even though they don’t know if any of us (other than land lessors) will benefit.  I ask myself and you, does it make sense to buy anything and not know the benefits?  I also ask myself if they really don’t know the basics about the benefits what do they really know about the costs (risks)?

As I think about this I become very angry.  I’m angry because they use their influence to gain support for fracking.  We trust these men to do what’s in our best interests and they exploit that trust.  I’m also angry (maybe angrier) that they don’t feel they’ve been irresponsible.  They think there’s nothing wrong with asking us to get on board even though they obviously don’t understand the benefits and probably don’t understand the costs.  We should ask these men to do their homework or perhaps find someone else to represent us.   They are after all, acting irresponsibly.

From:  Jim Guy, OldTown, Allehany County, MD

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How Fracking May Impact Your Health (Learning from Pennsylvania)

>>> From Engage Mountain Maryland, www.EngageMMd.org, EngageMountainMaryland@gmail.com

When the fracking rush consumed Pennsylvania, little was known about how industrial gas development could impact their residents’ health. With years of citizen complaints and health studies, evidence shows documented threats from fracking operations.

Studies by institutions have revealed issues such as respiratory problems, headaches, high blood pressure, anemia, heart attacks, and cancers as a result of gas drilling. Damaging effects have also been discovered on immune and reproductive systems, child development, and low birth weights for infants born near fracking sites.

Two guest speakers will be visiting Garrett County from Southwestern Pennsylvania who have been on the front lines, assisting victims of fracking. Raina Rippel, Director of  The Environmental Health Project (EHP) along with Jill Kriesky, MS, PhD, Associate Director, will be delivering a compelling program that outlines common health risks associated with communities engulfed in natural gas development.

This informative public session is to help the public better understand health risks associated with natural gas development and fracking. The general public is invited to attend this free event as well as health professionals who could greatly benefit from the program and share its content with others.

Wednesday, December 14 at 6:00PM

Ace’s Run Restaurant & Pub (lower level)

20160 Garrett Highway

Oakland, MD 21550

You can help protect our water!

Your Comments are Needed on Antero Landfill Project

Announcement from WV Rivers Coalition, August 22, 2016

Public Hearing Tomorrow, August 23, 2016, in West Union, WV

The WVDEP is currently accepting comments on two permit applications for Antero’s landfill project, 401 water quality certification and NPDES stormwater construction permit. The permit application for these large projects should be very detailed, but both lack all the information that WVDEP needs to certify the projects will not significantly impact our water.

The proposed Antero landfill and wastewater treatment facility encompasses approximately 486 acres located in Doddridge and Ritchie Counties, view our fact sheet on the project here. The facility would treat fracking wastewater for re-use and dispose of the salt byproducts in the attached landfill. It is still unclear how they plan to dispose of the sludge byproduct. The project would impact 89 streams and 11 wetlands and is located within Hughes River Water Board’s drinking water protection area. To submit comments to WVDEP on Antero’s 401 application click here and to submit comments on Antero’s stormwater permit click here. 

View WV Rivers’ comments on the 401 application and stormwater permit. 

The WVDEP is holding a public hearing on the Antero stormwater permit tomorrow, 8/23/16, in West Union, WV. Attend the public hearing and use your voice to protect our water!

What: Antero Landfill Stormwater Permit Public Hearing
When: August 23, 2016 at 6:00 p.m.
Where: Doddridge County High School Auditorium, 79 Bulldog Dr, West Union, WV 26456

FracTracker Alliance staff meeting

Explore a Fracking Operation — Virtually (like being there)!

From a Video Program by Samantha Malone, et al, FracTraker Alliance

FracTracker Mission –

The FracTracker Alliance shares maps, data, and analyses to communicate impacts of the global oil and gas industry and informs actions that positively shape our energy future.

FracTracker Vision –

FracTracker is a leading resource on oil and gas issues and a trusted asset to the concerned public.

Read our Data Statement below for more information.

FracTracker Data Statement —

How We Use Date — A fundamental emphasis of FracTracker.org is to increase transparency of and access to data and information relating to unconventional oil and natural gas development. Toward this end, we adhere to the following principles:

We respect data privacy; We acknowledge a variety of goals by end users; We collect, share, and utilize a continuum of data – from agency data sets to crowd-sourced data; We strive to make the data we use in mapping and analysis easily available to our users via the data downloads section of our website.

On Meta Data –

To help our users understand and evaluate the data on our site we provide open forums for comment and provide metadata – a systematic description of the dataset when used in our maps or analyses. Metadata addresses:

Who is responsible for the original content; What is included in the dataset and what abbreviations stand for; When the events in the data took place; Where the data features are located; How the data may have been altered from the original, if at all.

On Open Data –

Finally, we believe in the concept of open data – that certain data should be freely available to everyone to use and republish as they wish, with as few restrictions as possible.

Email us with questions: info@fractracker.org.

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EXPLORE A FRACKING OPERATION – VIRTUALLY Here

From Samantha Malone, et al, FracTracker Alliance, 2016

Modern oil and gas extraction no longer involves just a well, pump, and tank. The process can be so overwhelmingly complex that in lieu of taking a tour in person, it helps to explore each stage through photos. On this page you will find a virtual guide to the process of unconventional oil and gas extraction, as shown through the eyes of our Community Liaison, Bill Hughes. Eventually we will add a section on frac sand mining and transport, as well as other ancillary sectors.

Scroll down this page to explore the 14 key processes by section. Use the right & left arrows in each section to advance the images.

1.  Introduction

2.  Site Prep

3.  Drilling overview

4.  Well Casing & Cementing

5.  Completions & Hydraulic Fracturing

6.  Storage & Impoundments

7.  Hydraulic Fracturing Pumps & Mixers

8.  Sand Cans, Kings, & Castles

9.  Fracturing Chemicals, Trucks, & Totes

10. After Production: Flaring, Well Heads, Storage Tanks

11. Production Separators

12. Multipurpose Equipment

13. Pipelines & Compressors

14. Waste Disposal

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See also: http://www.FracTracker.org

Public Meeting in Doddridge County on Proposed Antero Wastewater Treatment Facility

Commentary by S. Tom Bond, Jane Lew, Lewis County, WV

The Doddridge County Commission held a public meeting Tuesday evening, September 15, on the Proposed Antero Wastewater Treatment Facility along Route 50. The plan is to locate it at approximately 39^o 16′ N and 80^o 54′ W, near Greenwood in that county.

The principal speaker was the General Manager of the Area for Antero, which has large holdings in northwest West Virginia and southeast Ohio.

The purpose of the facility is to receive wastewater from wells which have been subject to slick water fracturing and return it to a state where it can be reused in the industry. Antero already has an extensive system of pipes for fresh water, he said, consisting of 103 miles of buried lines, 80 miles of temporary lines and 24 impoundments in West Virginia. This helps them when it is dry and fresh water streams are too low. It also helps reduce the miles water trucks must travel.

The new facility will cost $1.5 million, and have capacity to receive 100 tanker truck loads a day. It was claimed that the salt produced could be used for roads, and would be “merchantable,” but a landfill is being installed adjacent to the plant. The water would be used exclusively for further fracking. The audience was assured there would be no damage from the natural radioactivity which accompanies Marcellus waste. This caused a great deal of opposition in the comment period afterwards, including from a land fill expert.

The speaker, when pressed, said they would allow third party sampling of the products produced. In the comment period practically all comment was against allowing the plant. The one speaker for the plant announced he worked for Antero before he began. One lady reminded the Antero people that the local community had not only the present to consider, but the effect on their children and heirs. When asked how long the plastic sheet on the bottom of the holding ponds would last, the speaker replied “for a thousand years.”

This author is a trained chemist with some additional knowledge of toxicology. He was appalled by the complete absence of chemistry and chemical engineering in the presentation. When the speaker was touting the expertise that went into the plant all he talked about was the architect they hired to plan it. It seems strange that a new process of this scale would be attempted without chemical knowledge of how the process worked, since it is, apparently, a first.

The speaker talked as though he did not understand that “brine” and “salt” did not mean sodium chloride solution, but is a far more general term applied to other compounds and mixtures. What comes up as flowback and produced water is a complex, highly variable mixture, varying from place to place and time to time from the same well. How does this relate to the idea the salt would be merchantable?

The claim that polyethylene sheets used in holding ponds would last 1000 years is disquieting, also. Sounds like a project engineered by MBA’s. But, heck, if it can get past the regulatory agencies and local officials, none of which has the right kind of expertise to understand the process, why not use it? Right?