Pennsylvania allows gas drillers to dump pollution into drinking water supplies

[Judi Lynn]

Pennsylvania allows gas drillers to dump pollution into drinking water supplies
By The Associated Press
Monday, January 3rd, 2011 -- 3:19 pm

The natural gas boom gripping parts of the U.S. has a nasty byproduct: wastewater so salty, and so polluted with metals like barium and strontium, that most states require drillers to get rid of the stuff by injecting it down shafts thousands of feet deep. Not in Pennsylvania, one of the states at the center of the gas rush.

There, the liquid that gushes from gas wells is only partially treated for substances that could be environmentally harmful, then dumped into rivers and streams from which communities get their drinking water.

In the two years since the frenzy of activity began in the vast underground rock formation known as the Marcellus Shale, Pennsylvania has been the only state allowing waterways to serve as the primary disposal place for the huge amounts of wastewater produced by a drilling technique called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

State regulators, initially caught flat-footed, tightened the rules this year for any new water treatment plants but allowed any existing operations to continue discharging water into rivers.

More:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/01/pennsylvania-gas-drillers-dump-pollution-drinking-water-supplies/

[HopeHoops]

1. Yeah, and asswipe Corbett wants to give them whatever they want.

Primarily that means no taxes (only state that doesn't tax them) and gutting what few regulations we have.

[PA Democrat]

2. Asswipe is too kind.

I don't have much respect for my fellow Pennsylvanians who voted for that filthy corporate whore either.

[HopeHoops]

3. They're the same ones who voted for fuckwad Toomey.

[Lugnut]

4. They're idiots.

I'm not looking forward to total Republic control of my state.

[femrap]

5. This is simply

unbelievable to me. Can't the EPA (I know) do anything?????

[joshcryer]

12. Nope, Energy Act of 2005 forbids them from doing anything, even.

The frackers are completely exempt from the Clean Air and Clean Water acts. It's atrocious. Watch Gasland.

[femrap]

13. Yes....now I remember.

They're exempt. Disgusting....you'd think Prez Change could do something.

I'm in Ohio and my family are all getting gas...I can smell it when I visit them. I asked them about fracking....no clue. Bunch of Dumfukistanis. Free gas....who cares if you don't have water????

They didn't have a clue. I'm the elitist who spews 'liberal commie thoughts.'

[joshcryer]

14. Without the House it'll be damn near impossible to pass the one paragraph long Fract Act. :/

They won't be able to repeal the exemptions for at least two years. The teabaggers would prefer everyone get a free ride at the cost of societal punishment.

[Altoid_Cyclist]

15. It also doesn't help when the head of the PA DEP (John Hanger)

sounds more like a lobbyist for the gas industry than the environment.

From the Green Party of PA: http://www.gp.org/press/pr-state.php?ID=194

The Green Party of Pennsylvania denounces the statements of acting PA Department of Environmental Protection Secretary John Hanger and called for him to resign. Last week, Mr. Hanger said the economic benefits of drilling for gas in the Marcellus Shale were worth the 'inevitable' environmental damage, including poisoning of some residents' water sources. According to Reuters, "He acknowledged that some of the chemicals could be dangerous to human health but said that risk has to be weighed against the benefits that will come from the exploitation of what he called the 'enormous' gas reserves contained in the Marcellus Shale." (http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE52J6AP20090320). The same article mentioned that there are reports that the northeast PA town of Dimock has contaminated well water resulting from the 'fracking' process used in gas drilling.

"John Hanger should hand in his resignation. He is not protecting our
water," said Jay Sweeney, Green Party Wyoming County. "I attended a meeting a few weeks ago about this. Dimock residents were very upset that they are not getting results from DEP or their State Representative," Sweeney concluded. "He is overemphasizing the benefits of drilling for gas and is willing to trade long term water contamination for a short term increase in the supply of natural gas in a time of diminishing water supplies worldwide."

This is from Alleghenydefense.org

There are two major problems with the DEP’s actions with regard to “approvals” of water withdrawals by Marcellus shale drillers. First, any notion that the DEP has a comprehensive regulatory scheme in place to keep a check on water withdrawals for Marcellus Shale gas drilling is simply erroneous. In fact, water resources law in Pennsylvania “is not guided by any comprehensive statutory or regulatory program.”1 Second, and most importantly, the DEP actually has no authority whatsoever to authorize or permit water withdrawals in Pennsylvania. In other words, if the DEP “authorizes” or “permits” water withdrawals for Marcellus Shale gas drilling, it is acting without authority and encouraging unlawful conduct…Read More

http://alleghenydefenseproject.wordpress.com/2010/07/27/letter-to-john-hanger-pa-department-of-environmental-protection-unlawfully-permitting-water-withdrawals/


PA and the other shale production states are being systematically contaminated and poisoned with virtually no regulations to stop these ***holes!

Coming soon to a river near you!

http://www.marcellus-shale.us/Dunkard_Creek.htm

[femrap]

16. It's simply heart breaking to

see people's water supplies poisoned. The Greed has reached such outlandish levels that I feel I'm living in a nightmare....like some horrid LSD trip.

Such short-sighted assh*les. May they choke on their money.

[Altoid_Cyclist]

17. You have to love the bizarro world nature of PA politics.

What other state would hire an Israeli version of Blackwater or Xe or whatever they call themselves this week to monitor "environmental terrorists" such as Josh Fox or anyone else that's concerned about safe drinking water?

Now we have Corbett ($1,000,000 or so from the oil and gas lobby) as our new Governor and our Ex-governor (duct tape & plastic Tom Ridge @ another $1,000,000 from the same groups) deciding who can drill where.

We are in the fight of our lives here.

[femrap]

18. I remember some saying about PA

politics. Eastern and Western PA were 'something' (I can't remember) but in the middle was Alabama.

Have you heard of this? I traveled to the middle once....a county where they dump all the murdered people. I didn't stay long.

[Altoid_Cyclist]

19. That was James Carville describing PA.

You have Philadelphia in the East, Pittsburgh in the West and Alabama in the middle.

Lucky me, I live in the middle! We import more trash (including some murder victims from the NY area who turn up in our landfills) than any other state . We still aren't even close to fixing all of the damage from the King Coal era. Pittsburgh still has some of the worst air pollution in the country. And now we're destroying what clean water remains in addition to adding airborn toxins and carcinogens from the Fracking process.

Even when they try to do something right such as wind power, they screw that up too!

See link for what I'm talking about. http://www.jvas.org/cc.html

This freaking state is such a joke and it's going to be exponentially worse with the reptilian takeover of the state government. Damn...I miss Connecticut!

[femrap]

22. The Rust Belt states have

been so demoralized. I call Ohio Dumfukistan...anyone with brains left and I don't blame them. I left Ohio after college and lived in N. CA and other places. Now I'm back. It's a mere shadow of itself.

I just keep thinking that Mother Nature is going to have the last say. These greedy men can't get away with this.

[Altoid_Cyclist]

23. I hope that you're right.

Corbett has already loaded his staff with people connected to the gas exploration companies. Of course I'm certain that it has nothing to do with the $1,000,000 that they contributed to his campaign. I'm also certain that a lot of people in this state will believe that last statement.

This is a scary(scarier?) time to be living in PA.

[Nihil]

20. Wow ... isn't *that* a damning quote?

> Last week, Mr. Hanger said the economic benefits of drilling for gas in the
> Marcellus Shale were worth the 'inevitable' environmental damage, including
> poisoning of some residents' water sources. According to Reuters, "He acknowledged
> that some of the chemicals could be dangerous to human health but said that risk
> has to be weighed against the benefits that will come from the exploitation of
> what he called the 'enormous' gas reserves contained in the Marcellus Shale."

-- acting PA Department of Environmental Protection Secretary John Hanger

:wow:

That is just such a mind-blowingly blatant example of the "fuck you all for my profit"
attitude that it really does make one question whether one woke up this morning or
if it is some weird extended nightmare ...

[Altoid_Cyclist]

21. I'm guessing that Mr. Hanger doesn't have any drilling activity on his property.

Has anyone in a position such as his ever made a statement that so utterly epitomizes the polar opposite of what his job duties are?

Luckily, he's on his way out as PA DEP head, but the precedent has been set.

[elehhhhna]

6. This is truly ridiculous. Fracing fluids can be recovered. There's no reason to discharge thi

s crap into streams and rivers.

[joshcryer]

11. Recycling the fluids costs money and it's impossible to prevent groundwater contamination.

The only way is to study the geology of a location and be absolutely sure such contamination is not possible.

This would reduce the number of viable sites, however.

PA has the largest watershed in the world. And the fucking frackers are going to make it unusable.

[Kolesar]

7. New York State has halted Marcellus Shale fracking for the time being

eom

[madrchsod]

8. the delaware river---big pictures

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/0/05/20100626083403!Delaware_River_DWG_USA.jpg

[JohnWxy]

9. business will police itself, dontcha know?

.. really, you can trust MEEEE.

..Mr. Magoo

[joshcryer]

10. Watch Gasland guys, it's incredible what the gas industry is getting away with.

No wonder the gas industry supports wind.