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

Down Fracking’s Memory Lane – Remembering What Some Would Rather Forget

Commentary by S. Tom Bond, Concerned Citizen of Lewis County, WV, July 30, 2015

Remember when horizontal slickwater fracking began? How it was a triumph of private enterprise, when in fact it had been invented at Morgantown WV in the US Department of Energy facility.

Remember how they have just wanted the government to get out of the way so they could do their thing? And how George P. Mitchell was actually supported by government grants, and how it took the industry a couple of years to catch on to the thing after he showed it would work? That still isn’t mentioned in standard short references about Mitchell. Government invention and subsidy contravenes “the Gospel of Big Business.”

Remember how they said “fracking” was 60 years old? Implying it was the same process that Halliburton used to gain it’s position and employ the backroom bard Richard Cheney? And speaking of Cheney, remember the US Energy Policy Act of 2005? And the sneaky industry meeting called by Vice-president Cheney (acting as Big Daddy to the President) that came before the bill, where the energy executives decided they wanted to obliterate the protections in law about clean air, safe drinking water, clean everything. How it reduced taxes on the industry? Made biofuels viable and increased world grain prices? The result is now called the “Cheney Loophole.” Hillary Clinton called it the “Dick Cheney lobbyist energy bill.”

Remember the claim, “We never did anybody any harm.” Now it is shown by science that people anywhere near fracking are subject to air pollution from a bouquet of toxic chemicals, and assaulted by the smells, and sent to the hospital more frequently than people living further away. Now people can take pictures of the layer of pollution in fracking areas, and scientists can measure it and connect it with safety hazards? Asthma, low birth rates and “natural” abortions, all are related to fracking.

Remember how it didn’t harm ground water? But there were plenty of pictures of forlorn people holding up containers of gunky stuff that had come out of their wells. And the drillers went ahead and put out “water buffalos,” out of the kindness of their hearts, then abandoned them when they left the neighborhood? Analysis showed there was a wide variety of pollutants affecting health in well water afterwards. Many endocrine disrupters are known in fracking fluids and vanishingly low concentrations are required to have an effect.

Remember when it began, how they got their water to drill? Picked it up where ever they could, sometimes reducing the stream flows to the point where wild life was affected? In one case at least it was stolen from a public water system. And how the waste water was dumped where ever it was convenient? In the creeks, in abandoned mines, through municipal sewage treatment plants.

They even spread it on roads to control dust, where it promptly was washed into adjoining streams by the next rain. They brought a microorganism from Texas in uncleaned waste water trucks. That organism contaminated Dunkard Creek, near Morgantown, and killed off the wildlife. (Some 40,000 fish and other creatures.)

Now we read about the danger of radiation in streams in fracking areas.

The pumping of the huge quantities of water through pipelines from rivers and disposal are now somewhat improved. But by pumping frack liquid waste down wells, thousands of gallons per day, day after day which go into the barely visible cracks in the rocks at depth, miniearthquakes result. And, some of these earthquakes are significant, maybe all.

What the U.S. frackers are doing is sucking our limited reserve through a bigger straw – to export. This will leave us to import somewhere down the line – think about who gets the fortunes to be made by this development, and where it leaves our children and grandchildren? Energy “independence” now, disaster a generation or two down the line. The claims that all the pipelines are for U.S. home use are obviously camouflage. All roads once lead to Rome, now all pipelines lead to the sea.

Europe is way ahead of us. Both French and Dutch companies are forbidden to frack in their own countries. Denmark kicked the French company Total out after ONE DAY of fracking and is going to all wind power in the next few years. Spain, with lots of sunshine, is big on solar.

D’ya suppose it is possible to live without fracking?

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

See also:  www.Marcellus-Shale.us

From: www.marcellus-shale.us

By S. Tom Bond, Co-Editor of FrackCheckWV and a resident farmer in Lewis County, WV

At the present the shale drilling industry is not required to carry insurance against any damage it might cause in West Virginia nor most other states. This is consistent with the claim they never do any damage to health, aquifers, livestock, property value, or in fact most anything else. It comes from the story they tell politicians, judges and smaller business men. It results in the hard nose position they adopt in court, and most importantly, helps keep any third party from objective evaluation of their drilling.

An insurance industry article, see below, begins by pointing to a long list of damages that have unequivocally been caused by shale drilling for gas and by similar kinds of contamination. These comprise many of the 27 references. Similar kinds of contamination are used to estimate the cost to the public of remediation damages to be expected from the drilling industry.

The article recognizes these categories of anticipated problems: contaminated aquifers, poor air quality, surface spills and health effects of natural gas production related chemicals. (Disclosure: the author is a member of an environmental group seeking to clean up damages caused by coal mining a century ago, using public funds. That extraction industry simply pawned off its damage on the public.)

Calculation of risk is exceedingly difficult, but the insurance industry is adept, and if brought into the job, has ways to both work out the risk and handle it financially in a way acceptable to the public for minimum cost. They do this by study of activities engaged in by drilling companies and comparison with problems experienced by other industries. For example, aquifer pollution by shale drilling is comparable to aquifer pollution by methyl-t-butyl ether, the gasoline additive which began to be recognized as a pollutant about 1990. Remediation would be very similar, both methods and cost.

Public anticipation of just compensation would go a long way to reduce the argument for moratoriums. Certain kinds of public loss, including Global Warming, would not be compensated by payment of damage to individuals, of course.

Several methods of insurance companies dealing with large potential losses are unfamiliar to most of us. They are prepared for loses beyond those in the historical record. Insurance companies which engage in large risk have other insurance companies to insure them. These are called re-insurers. Beyond this, insurance- linked-securities accept risk of re-insurers. So, insurance companies are able to accept very large, infrequent risks.
Where several companies are drilling in an area, the insurance companies which would insure them can work together, offering similar insurance policies to each and sharing the largest risks. The insurance industry “spreads the risk.” Competition between companies would insure lowest cost to the drillers.

Insurance also would help with a nasty practice engaged in by the drilling industry. They often form a small Limited Liability Corporation or Limited Liability Partnership to drill only one (or a few) well(s) and then flick out of existence after drilling and transfer of ownership to a larger company for maintenance and production. If a large loss occurs, the business simply goes bankrupt and the injured individuals and/or the public is left holding the bag.

Insurance helps not only the injured, but the companies themselves. For example, if they have bad luck, they do not have to go broke by paying damages that cut far into their capital assets.

The authors below also say: “Another benefit of insurance requirements is that energy producers will have additional incentive to employ best practices, because any reduction to their expected insurable losses will allow them to realize savings through premium rate reductions. In situations where there are disagreements or distrust between energy regulators and the energy producers, insurers could play a valuable role as an independent third party known to be focused solely on those safety practices that are most effective and cost-efficient. Insurers may also provide valuable advice based on experience in underwriting similar risks in other regions around the world.”

And finally, “Considering the history of pollution costs associated with energy production, the potential risks of fracking, and the expected expansion over the next several decades, there are compelling reasons for all parties involved to come together, consider all possibilities, and invest the time and effort in order to make sure we have the most effective systems in place to cover the pollution costs now, rather than later.”

It seems that to require insurance coverage of shale drilling would be best for all parties involved including the injured, the companies and also government regulators, because of the risk-management expertise they provide.

Information for this article was taken from “Fracking: Considerations for risk management and financing,” appearing in INSIGHT, published 21 June 2012. It was written by Richard Soulsby, Jason Kurtz and Bhavini Kamarshi. INSIGHT is published by Millman, a company that does insurance analysis. However, the author’s interpretation is from the point of view of the embattled victim trying to get just compensation for the very obvious effects of shale drilling. The article is located at:

 http://insight.milliman.com/article.php?cntid=8107