Inergy Protested in Watkins Glen, NY, August 17th

More than 200 people protested loudly against the proposed Inergy propane and natural gas storage facility Friday, April 17. The people oppose putting millions of gallons propane (and eventually natural gas) in salt caverns below the glacier-built Seneca Lake. Already the company has been spilling salty brine water into the lake without even telling regulators of the violations.

NO NATURAL GAS STORAGE IN THE SALT CAVERNS BELOW SENECA LAKE!   OUR HEALTH AND THE HEALTH OF OUR CHILDREN MUST COME FIRST.

MARC 1 Gas Pipeline To Be Installed Near Elementary School

If your child attends the Wyalusing Valley Elementary School in Wyalusing, PA,  I suppose you will be glad to know that measures will be taken during the installation of the MARC 1 pipeline to insure your child's safety.  Noise pollution will be kept to an acceptable minimum, and the school district's water well will be protected from contamination.  Great!  No problem.  However, if you think perhaps there might still be a problem with putting in a 30-inch wide major pipeline a mere 897 feet from the school building,  you might not be so impressed with all the precautions the Central New York Oil and Gas Company is taking.  The Susquehanna River is near the school.  This pipeline operation will bore beneath the river only 40 feet underneath the river bottom.  Noise-producing equipment used to drill under the river will be located 875 feet from the school.  Central NY Oil and Gas has hired a noise consultant.  Sound barriers will be put up.  Nice touch there. And the best part- a full-time environmental inspector will be on site.  So all bases have been covered I guess.  The drilling company has assured Wyalusing residents that the pipeline would not pose any danger to students.  So don't we all feel better now?

Read the article from the Towanda Daily Review here. LINK
Read what Standing Stone resident Diane Ward said about the approval process for this pipeline.  Very interesting.  Also Google "pipeline accidents."  You might be surprised. Here's one site to start with: LINK.

And if you would like a broader perspective, here is a presentation from 2005 entitled "Restoring Public Trust in Pipeline Safety."

Pipelines are very dangerous.  They should not be installed near ANYTHING, much less an elementary school.  Are we crazy to allow this to happen?  I think we are.

This Picture Is Changing Due To Gas Wells and MARC1 Pipeline

Join 22,000 other people who’ve already spoken out against the construction of a huge gas pipeline that would ruin the beauty of Pennsylvania’s Endless Mountains – a region of rolling green hills, farms, covered bridges, and waterfalls. Trouble is brewing as developers plan a massive 39-mile gas pipeline, known as the MARC 1 Hub Line Project, that would cut through 610 acres in Bradford, Sullivan, and Lycoming Counties and bring with it heavy machinery, roads, and other unwanted development.  It will cross high quality streams as well and spur gas drilling in previously undeveloped areas while threatening public health and the environment. 

EarthJustice hopes to persuade a court that a full environmental impact statement is necessary to approve the MARC 1 pipeline.  If this effort is successful, it will be the FIRST such study of Marcellus Shale impacts in Pennsylvania.

Click here to go to the EarthJustice page. There is a map of the pipeline there.  Look for the Take Action button to take you to the page where you can click on "Which do you like better? Picnics or Pipelines?  You can add your name to those opposed!

Take action now before the July 11th deadline!

The photo above: You are looking down at French Azilum in Bradford County as seen from Route 6 at the Marie Antoinette Lookout.  Why do we need to destroy this view?

SPLASHDOWN Water Drops: Karen Korell's Artistry

Here are some of the little water drops which Karen Korell designed and drew.  Karen died August 30, 2010.  We will all miss her very much.  Her water drops were very unique and were just one example of her creativity and her passion for the environment and public health.

We need clean water.

The gas industry is exempt from The Safe Drinking Water Act

Dirty water cannot be washed.

Can you light your tap water on fire?  Some people can.

Karen fought hard for passage of the FRAC Act.  It is still unpassed.

DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY!

New Report From Texas: The Ill Effects of Gas Drilling on Public Health

Below is a report delivered by Sharon Wilson on behalf of the Texas Oil and Gas Project and the Fort Worth Citizens Against Neighborhood Drilling Operations.

Hello. My name is Sharon Wilson. This afternoon, I'm making a joint statement on behalf of the Texas Oil and Gas Accountability Project and Fort Worth Citizens Against Neighborhood Drilling Operations. Texas Oil and Gas Accountability Project has put forth Drill-Right Texas, the best oil and gas development practices for Texas.

Texas OGAP considers the new ozone standard one of several essential tools needed in a regional plan to clean our air. Tougher standards will prevent natural gas extraction from continuing to foul our air and harm our health. A 2009 study by SMU found that emissions from Barnett Shale natural gas extraction were as much as vehicular emissions in the entire Dallas-Fort Worth region. This study was based on text book examples but the reality could be a much worse picture. Researchers at Rice University followed the SMU study to see whether Barnett Shale gas production could be affecting our air quality. Using both condensate production data and ambient air data from Denton County, those researchers found a strong correlation between natural gas production and what was showing up in the air.

This really isn't news. In 2003, atmospheric researchers from the University of California were surprised to find extraordinarily high hydrocarbon levels in North Texas at concentrations higher than what they expected for the entire country. We know that fugitive emissions occur at every stage of production from flow lines and gathering lines, from vents and condensate tanks, dehydrators and compressors, metering stations and valves. A single compression facility can emit six times the volatile organic compounds as a cement plant.

Natural gas is methane, and methane is the most powerful greenhouse gas—at least 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide. And methane is a surrogate gas that carries a host of bad guy carcinogens and neurotoxins with it.

From cradle to grave, the extraction process is filthy and brings with it its own intense source of on-road and off-road diesel and NOx emissions. In Texas, the permit by rule process is abused allowing all these emissions to go unchecked. Eleven compression stations and 4 metering stations operate side-by-side in Dish, Texas, each considered a separate source. Residents suffer a host of ailments including irritated skin, eyes, nose throat and lungs, headaches, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, skin rashes, weakness and irregular heartbeats. A whopping 61% of those health effects were directly attributed to the emissions. And throughout the Shale, children suffer stunning asthma rates -- 25% of 8 and 9 year-olds have asthma -- compared to 7 percent of children statewide.

TCEQ knows our air is bad! When asked about the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality's testing in the Barnett Shale, Shannon Ethridge, TCEQ toxicologist, said they had seen some of the highest benzene concentrations they have monitored in the state. She compared the DFW area emissions to those found in the highly industrialized Houston Ship Channel area. Michael Honeycutt, chief of TCEQ's toxicology division, told Channel 8 News that air samplings around some gas wells revealed high levels of cancerous toxins.

"That would be equivalent to opening a can of gasoline and holding it up under your nose."

He added that a year or more of exposure to benzene can lead to health problems including anemia, immune disorders and leukemia. We're way past that one year mark. The technology is there to reduce the emissions and industry can afford to implement it but they wont unless its mandated. We are depending on you to protect public health by mandating and enforcing vigorous new regional ozone standards.

DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY!

Natural Gas Should Not Be a Transition Fuel

Mary Sweeney of Upstate NY, writing on the Susquehanna County Gas Forum online, writes:

The gas industry has played up the possibility of using natural gas as a "transition" fuel. However, the gas locked up in the shale will take decades to extract. Moreover, that gas will be expensive to extract and extracting the gas presents very serious public health and environmental problems. In the end, even taking into account unconventional sources like shale gas and coal bed methane, this country does NOT possess that much natural gas in comparison to what is available in Russia and the Middle East.

If we convert more and more of our energy usage to natural gas, it will not be long before we are forced to turn to Russia and the Middle East for our natural gas. Meanwhile, we will have trashed some of our most valuable resources (e.g. water) in trying to squeeze more gas from the shale.

Rather than investing a HUGE amount of money in drilling the shale and then trying to clean up the environmental and public health mess that results, it would make a great deal more sense to invest that money in renewable energy sources. And if we get truly serious about energy efficiency and conservation, we will use up less fossil fuel in the meantime. That is the way to make the transition--by using less coal, oil, and natural gas. A transition based on conservation can begin immediately, will help the environment rather than harming it, and will save people money, because using less energy costs less money. Needless to say, the fossil fuel industry has its own reasons for NOT wanting people to conserve--they would like us all to keep buying fossil fuel, regardless of the environmental and health problems that will result.

We don't need a transitional fuel. We need to understand that fossil fuel use is not the way to go forward, that we have already wasted several decades and a lot of money pretending that fossil fuel use could go on and on, and that we need to stop repeating past errors and get serious about conservation and renewable energy.

My sentiments exactly! -Peacegirl

DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY!