Trump's Wrong-Headed Energy Plan Ignores Clean Energy Revolution and Climate Change

Trump’s “America First” Energy Plan Leaves America Behind

January 30, 2017 Roland Hwang   Kit Kennedy    
National Resources Defense Council 
 

On the eve of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources confirmation vote for Rick Perry to be Secretary of Energy, it’s important to take a close look at the Trump administration’s plans for America’s energy future. The administration’s new webpage on “An America First Energy Plan” is—like much of the president’s rhetoric—wrong-headed, short on details, and divorced from reality.

In fact, it’s most notable for what it doesn’t say — there’s not a word about the clean energy revolution, a boom in wind, solar, and energy efficiency that is creating millions of jobs, saving billions of dollars, and even saving lives by cutting pollution. This misleading plan not only fails to put America first — it threatens to pull America back to the 20^th century. NRDC will fight to make sure that the Trump administration doesn’t succeed at making America’s energy choices worse.

Here’s a look at a breakdown of the Trump plan [in italics] contrasted with the authors' comments on what that plan gets wrong [no italics]:

The Trump Administration is committed to energy policies that lower costs for hardworking Americans ...

One of the best tools at our disposal to slash energy bills is energy efficiency — but it isn’t mentioned anywhere in the Trump plan. Since 1987, federal energy efficiency standards on appliances and equipment have saved Americans a cumulative total of $2 trillion on energy costs. Standards set in 2016 alone will save $75 billion on utility bills. With such tremendous cost-cutting power, it’s no wonder that federal efficiency standards have long enjoyed bipartisan support. Leaving efficiency out of an energy plan is a major oversight.

Despite wild swings in fossil fuel prices, America’s electricity bills and the per-kilowatt-hour rates recorded on them have been relatively stable and affordable for decades, thanks in good part to leadership at the state level in support of energy efficiency and renewable resources. In fact, after adjusting for inflation, U.S. electricity is cheaper today than it was more than a quarter-century ago, in 1990. And in some regions, solar and wind energy are already cost-competitive with fossil fuels, helping to lower everyone’s utility bills.

…and maximize the use of American resources… 

In 2015, nearly 70 percent of new electric generation came from American wind and solar power. Yet these American energy resources aren’t mentioned at all in the Trump plan — even though many heartland states, both red and blue, want more, as clean energy is helping revive both rural and rust-belt economies. And let’s not forget that Rick Perry’s home state of Texas is a national leader in wind energy. Today, more than 2.5 million Americans work in clean energy, from skilled factory workers making batteries for hybrid vehicles to military veterans who now scale turbine towers as wind energy technicians. China plans to create 13 million jobs by 2020 by investing in clean power. Where are the clean energy jobs in the Trump plan?

...freeing us from dependence on foreign oil.

Thanks to strong clean car and fuel economy standards set under the Obama administration, we’re already loosening the grip of oil dependence. The standards, which will double mileage for cars and light trucks by 2025, will also cut oil consumption by 1.5 million barrels per day — equivalent to current U.S. imports from the Persian Gulf. Standards save money for consumers, too —  nearly $4,000 over the lifetime of a vehicle. According to the BlueGreen Alliance, clean car standards will also create more than half a million jobs nationwide.

For too long, we’ve been held back by burdensome regulations on our energy industry.

The data clearly shows that environmental safeguards, rather than being a burden, have drastically cut pollution over the past 40 years while the economy has enjoyed tremendous growth. As the U.S. Environmental Protection reports, from 1970 to 2015, the Clean Air Act helped cut 70 percent of the soot and smog from American skies while the economy grew 246 percent. More than double the growth, less than half the pollution. That’s progress. Meanwhile, due to energy efficiency progress accelerated by appliance and equipment standards and building energy codes, the historical link between economic growth and total energy use was broken four decades ago and has not reappeared. GDP increased by 30 percent between 2000 and 2015, while total energy consumption remained flat.

President Trump is committed to eliminating harmful and unnecessary policies such as the Climate Action Plan and the Waters of the U.S. rule. Lifting these restrictions will greatly help American workers, increasing wages by more than $30 billion over the next 7 years.

The 117 million people whose drinking water supplies depend on Waters of the U.S. protections would hardly call it unnecessary. And when climate change creates international instability, dries up crops and ranchland, swamps low-lying communities and drives extreme weather that cost taxpayers $100 billion in 2012 alone, an action plan is surely in order. The Clean Power Plan aims to cut carbon pollution from power plants by 40 percent. Efficiency standards for appliances and federal buildings will play a big role in this, with a goal of cutting 3 billion metric tons of carbon emissions by 2030. There’s no reference to back up the wage increase mentioned in the Trump plan, but studies on the Clean Power Plan have shown that it would create as many as 274,000 jobs and deliver climate and health benefits worth $53 to $93 billion every year — including saving thousands of lives.

Anti-Fracking Law: Public Comments Move Amherst Town Board to Revise

Planning Board to review draft of anti-fracking law

The Town Board during its meeting on Monday directed the Planning Board to review a draft local law that would ban hydraulic fracturing, also known as “fracking,” in Amherst.

Fracking is the process of drilling and injecting fluid into the ground at high pressure in order to fracture shale rocks and release the natural gas inside. People who oppose the practice believe it poses many dangers to the environment and could result in health risks to residents.

During a public comment period, Rita Yelda, a member of the community group Amherst Against Fracking, said the draft, created by the Town Attorney’s Office, lacks strength because it doesn’t cite the proper definitions of hydraulic fracturing.

Several residents following Yelda reiterated the importance of creating strong legislation that bans hydrofracking and its wastes in the Town of Amherst.

Following the comments from the public, Deputy Supervisor Guy Marlette said the reason it was put on the board’s meeting agenda was to allow the Town Board to review it first to vet any issues, such as the ones that were addressed by residents.

Following the Town Attorney’s Office working with the Planning Board to possibly amend the draft, a public hearing will be held to allow further community input on the revised version.

Marlette added that although it has been about 13 months since the Town Board directed the Town Attorney’s Office to draft a law banning fracking in the town, it was not an excessive time period.

“Our intent is to pass a law and have all of the definitions in place for a strong law,” Marlette said.

Read the full report at the Amherst Bee

For earlier reports on the dangers of fracking waste, Click Here.

Local Groups to Protest Anti-Environmental Keynote Speaker outside Gas Lobby Meeting

Protest: No More Fracking Lies! 

Wednesday, Nov. 12th at 4 p.m. 

Hyatt Regency, 2 Fountain Plaza, Buffalo

To view updates and join the Event on Facebook, click here.

The Independent Oil & Gas Association of NY (IOGA-NY) is the chief oil and gas lobbying organization in New York, spending millions backing fracking and natural gas development in the state and opposing environmental safeguards. 

IOGA-NY will hold their 2014 Annual Meeting in Buffalo on November 11th and 12th. This year a keynote speaker is Jack Hubbard who will present a talk titled "Big Green Radicals: Winning Public Opinion, Undermining the Activist's Credibility and Changing the Debate." 

Hubbard works for a Washington D.C.-based consulting firm, Berman & Co., which specializes in undermining the work of environmentalists on behalf of the natural gas industry. 

The New York Times published a secretly recorded a speech given by Hubbard's colleague, Richard Berman, in which he solicited up to $3 million from oil and gas industry executives to finance the "Big Green Radicals" PR campaign. He promised the industry executives “total anonymity.”

Berman said in his speech, that industry executives must be willing to exploit emotions like fear, greed and anger and turn them against the environmental groups.  “You can either win ugly or lose pretty,” he said.

To view the New York Times article, click here. For a transcript of the speech by Berman, which also includes one by Jack Hubbard, click here.

The oil and gas industry doesn't have science behind them so companies resort to lies and innuendo invented by high-priced PR firms. Berman and Co. seems to be a leader in this effort -- getting millions of $$ from industry executives to smear environmental groups, and hiding the industry's role in funding his campaigns.

Jack Hubbard, the keynote speaker of the upcoming IOGA-NY Annual Meeting in Buffalo, spoke at a previous meeting about the national "Big Green Radicals" campaign. He announced that “the initial targets of that campaign were the Sierra Club, NRDC, and Food & Water Watch.” 

Targeting these groups for being opposed to fracking is a big mistake on Hubbard's part. These groups are united in that they all remain unconvinced of the industry-touted safety of shale gas drilling and fracking in the face of industry-caused well water damage, air pollution, toxic and radioactive wastewater, and earthquakes.

Jack Hubbard also mentioned digging-up “criminal records” that activists have. He said “We’re really making this personal. We’re trying to make it so that they don’t have any credibility with the public, with the media, or with legislators.”

Criminal records? Well, that's just ridiculous! Another thing the three environmental groups have in common is that they're law-abiding people. Most all are volunteers, giving their time to protect the quality of our water, air, land and health. 

Many people in the Buffalo area are members of the targeted groups that Hubbard attempts to discredit. Organizers hope that people will be moved to attend the protest on Nov. 12 or take action by exposing the despicable tactics of these gas industry-funded attack dogs to the public and media.

Protesters outside of the IOGA-NY Annual Meeting will demand that our legislators not listen to gas industry lies! 

Berman said "You can either win ugly or lose pretty."

Let's Win Pretty!  Click here to Join the Event on Facebook!

Cosponsors: Renewable Energy Task Force of WNY Peace Center, Sierra Club Niagara Group, Western NY Drilling Defense, Food & Water Watch, PAUSE, and the New Yorkers Against Fracking coalition.

~  ~  ~

See also:  

"Meet Dr. Evil" is the title of a CBS 60 Minutes interview of Berman, which can be viewed here. 

"Frack Attack Likely at Talk" by Brian Nearing at Times Union.
  

FRACKING NEWS

Families sick from fracking exposure turn to concerned scientists | The Inquirer

Like people in other regions transformed by the shale energy boom, residents of Washington County, Pennsylvania have complained of headaches, nosebleeds and skin rashes. But because there are no comprehensive studies about the health impacts of natural gas drilling, it's hard to determine if their problems are linked to the gas wells and other production facilities that have sprung up around them.

A group of scientists from Pennsylvania and neighboring states have stepped in to fill this gap by forming a nonprofit—apparently the first of its kind in the United States—that provides free health consultations to local families near drilling sites. Instead of waiting years or even decades for long-term studies to emerge, the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project (SWPA-EHP) is using the best available science to help people deal with their ailments.

The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection—which oversees the oil and gas industry—has no ongoing or planned health studies, though it is researching air and water quality at certain sites. None of the hundreds of millions of dollars in impact fees the state has collected from the industry since 2011 has gone to state or local health departments.

A governor-appointed commission recommended in 2011 that a health registry be created to track Pennsylvanians living near drilling sites. But no registry has been established. In June, the news organization StateImpact Pennsylvania reported that two former employees of the health department were told to avoid talking about Marcellus shale activity, and to stop returning phone calls from people concerned about drilling impacts.

Read the full report here.

Major Scientific Document Shows Why New York Fracking Moratorium Is Imperative | EcoWatch

Many New Yorkers continue to rally and push for a statewide fracking moratorium. In this vein, Concerned Health Professionals of New York (CHPNY) released a major resource to the public, including public officials, researchers and journalists—the Compendium of Scientific, Medical and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking.

“This compilation of findings brings together data from many fields of study and reveals the diversity of the problems with fracking—from increased flood risks to increased crime risks, from earthquakes to methane leaks,” said Sandra Steingraber, PhD. “What this multitude of threats all has in common is the ability to harm public health. That’s our message to Governor Cuomo and Acting Health Commissioner Zucker.”

As mounting evidence continues to find more costs than benefits to fracking, the compendium explains the motivation for compiling and making public the scientific, medical and media findings:
Despite this emerging body of knowledge, industry secrecy and government inaction continue to thwart scientific inquiry, leaving many potential problems—especially cumulative, long-term risks—unidentified, unmonitored and largely unexplored.

This problem is compounded by non-disclosure agreements, sealed court records and legal settlements that prevent families (and their doctors) from discussing injuries. As a result, no comprehensive inventory of human hazards yet exists.

The compendium covers in detail 15 dangers, risks and associated trends created by the fracking process.

In light of these findings, referenced with more than 300 citations, and remaining fundamental data gaps, CHPNY considers a fracking moratorium “the only appropriate and ethical course of action while scientific and medical knowledge on the impacts of fracking continues to emerge.”

The full report is here.

The compendium of dangers is current through June 30, 2014  and is available to download here.

EPA Draft Fracking Wastewater Guidance Suggests Closer Scrutiny for Treatment Plants | DeSmog

One of the most intractable problems related to fracking is that each well drilled creates millions of gallons of radioactive and toxic wastewater.

For the past several years, the Environmental Protection Agency has faced enormous public pressure to ensure this dangerous waste stops ending up dumped in rivers or causing contamination in other ways.

But the drilling boom has proceeded at such an accelerated pace in the United States that regulators have struggled to keep up, to control or even track where the oil and gas industry is disposing of this radioactive waste. As a consequence, hundreds of millions of gallons of partially treated waste have ended up in the rivers from which millions of Americans get their drinking water.

An internal draft EPA document leaked to DeSmog gives a small window into how, after a full decade since the start of the drilling boom, the agency is responding.

The document, dated March 7, 2014, is titled “National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Permitting and Pretreatment for Shale Gas Extraction Wastewaters: Frequently Asked Questions.”
It's revealing for what it shows about how EPA staff are taking the hazards of fracking wastewater more seriously — and also how little things have changed.

The document, intended as a guide for local regulators on how the Clean Water Act should be interpreted and applied, is impressive in many ways.

The EPA's new draft document now lists almost two dozen individual substances — like benzene, radium, and arsenic — that it says have been found at high enough levels in shale wastewater to cause concern. By contrast, the 2011 version focused mostly on the high levels of salts found in the waste.

The new document also explains that the substances it lists are not the only potential pollutants that must be removed before water can be considered fully treated and ready to enter rivers and streams. It explains that each treatment plant can only take wastewater once regulators are satisfied that they know what is actually in it.

Read the full report here.

Download the draft EPA document here.

GAO Report: Drinking Water at Risk from Underground Fracking Waste Injection | EcoWatch 

According to U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), this study was conducted because:

Every day in the U.S. at least 2 billion gallons of fluids are injected into more than 172,000 wells to enhance oil and gas production, or to dispose of fluids brought to the surface during the extraction of oil and gas resources. These wells are subject to regulation to protect drinking water sources under EPA’s UIC class II program and approved state class II programs. Because much of the population relies on underground sources for drinking water, these wells have raised concerns about the safety of the nation’s drinking water.

“The federal government’s watchdog (GAO) is saying what communities across the country have known for years: fracking is putting Americans at risk,” said Amy Mall, senior policy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council. ”From drinking water contamination to man-made earthquakes, the reckless way oil and gas companies deal with their waste is a big problem. Outdated rules and insufficient enforcement are largely to blame. EPA needs to rein in this industry run amok.”

Read the full report here.

Fracking’s methane problem: Study finds new, unconventional wells leak more than old ones | Salon

Controversial new research identifies defects in Pennsylvania's gas wells

Fracking in Pennsylvania’s natural gas-rich Marcellus shale has a major methane problem, a new study finds. Analyzing the data from more than 75,000 state inspections going back to 2000, a team of four researchers concluded that gas wells are leaking the chemical, a potent greenhouse gas with a long-term effect on global warming greater even than CO2′s, at an alarming rate.

The research, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, was led by Cornell University’s Anthony Ingraffea, a vocal opponent of fracking. The leaks, according to the study, might be due to problems in the wells’ cement casings. Basically, explained Ingraffea, “Something is coming out of it that shouldn’t, in a place that it shouldn’t.”

The crux of his findings, via the Associated Press:

• Overall, older wells — those drilled before 2009 — had a leak rate of about 1 percent. Most were traditional wells, drilling straight down. Unconventional wells — those drilled horizontally and commonly referred to as fracking — didn’t come on the scene until 2006 and quickly took over.

• Newer traditional wells drilled after 2009 had a leak rate of about 2 percent; the rate for unconventional wells was about 6 percent, the study found.

• The leak rate reached as high as nearly 10 percent horizontally drilled wells for before and after 2009 in the northeastern part of the state, where drilling is hot and heavy.

The full report is here.

The significance, abstract and link to the paper by Ingraffea et al. published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is here.

Energy Debate: Shale vs. Renewable

On Tuesday, November 19, from 12 noon to 1 PM on Buffalo's WUFO-AM 1080
radio, host Jim Anderson will interview Chris Faulkner, CEO of Breitling Oil and Gas.

The privately-held Dallas Texas based company extracts oil and gas from North Dakota's Bakken Shale, Texas' Eagle Ford Shale, the Marcellus Shale, and several other shale plays.

Accompanying Jim Anderson will be:

• Lynda Schneekoth, Chair, Sierra Club-Niagara Group
• Robert Ciesielski, Chair, Sierra Club-Niagara Group's Energy Committee
• Rita Yelda, Organizer, Food and Water Watch
• Charley Bowman, Chair, Renewable Energy Task Force of the WNY Peace Center.

Listeners with questions/comments can call: 716-837-1112
Folks outside WUFO's range can listen to the debate Online at:http://streema.com/radios/WUFO

Slide Show: Shale Gas Potential in New York

The slide show was produced and narrated by Jerry Acton, a Systems Engineer & Systems Architect (retired) at IBM and Lockheed. Acton describes an analytical procedure he developed that uses shale gas production data from Pennsylvania (PA) together with the depth and thickness of the Marcellus Shale along the PA-NY border to forecast shale gas production in New York and its economic impact.

A written report based on Acton's findings is HERE.

New York Lacks Economically Recoverable Shale Gas

Black diamonds represent uneconomic drilling (see text) -- Jerry Acton.

New York Shale Play Gets Major Downgrade

By Peter Mantius

BINGHAMTON, N.Y. — The real reason New York State has not allowed high-volume hydrofracking for natural gas in its Marcellus shale is that there is almost no gas that can be economically extracted, according to four retired professionals turned fracking analysts.

Their argument contradicts the gas industry’s narrative – widely accepted as fact by many landowners, investors, politicians and state regulators – that shale gas is a potential economic “game-changer” for poor, rural upstate New York.

For the past four years, two governors have repeatedly extended the state’s de facto moratorium on fracking while they tinkered with the rules. Since last fall, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has said he is waiting for the results of a vaguely defined health study, frustrating pro-gas groups with his apparent lack of urgency.

But the four analysts now argue that it’s geology – not health – that best explains Cuomo’s foot-dragging. In the governor’s cost-benefit analysis, they say, meager potential economic gains from drilling are not worth the environmental and political risk.

“The vast majority of the New York Marcellus shale is too thin (less than 150 feet thick) and too shallow (less than 4,500 feet) to yield economically recoverable natural gas,” said Jerry Acton, a retired systems engineer for IBM and Lockheed Martin who based his conclusions on drilling production results from neighboring Pennsylvania, where fracking is allowed.

Acton crunched four years of publicly available data supplied to regulators by Pennsylvania drillers. His analysis covered all 1,539 active natural gas wells drilled into the Marcellus shale in six counties that border New York. Acton found that median production results [Figure: Median IP chart, colored bars] for specific towns and counties [colored circles on map] correlate closely with the depth [white lines] and thickness [black lines & numbers] of the shale layer drilled. The deeper and thicker, the better.

That finding points to trouble for drilling prospects in New York, Acton said, because its Marcellus layer is relatively shallow and thin. While a cluster of Pennsylvania gas wells only 40 miles southwest of Binghamton have been highly successful, they tap a Marcellus layer that is much thicker and deeper than any in New York. As Pennsylvania drillers moved west of that sweet spot into thinner, shallower sections with geology similar to New York’s, gas production levels plummeted.

Read more at DC Bureau.

See also this economics report: Hyped Benefits of Fracked Gas Already Fading
By Deborah Rogers at EcoWatch

Shale Gas -- Revolution or Bubble?

Pennsylvania fracking boom goes bust
By Will Bunch, Daily News Staff Writer
It was just a couple of years ago that fracking was booming in upstate Pennsylvania's Bradford County, and Janet Geiger, a retired hospital worker living on a 10-acre spread near the New York border, could count on getting a $300 to $400 check every month from the gas giant Chesapeake Energy Corp., which was drilling under her land.

But both the gas and the checks - with the financially ailing Chesapeake now claiming big deductions - dwindled until finally, in March, a check never showed up. "I thought the mail had gotten lost," said Geiger, 74, but after a week she finally reached someone with the Oklahoma gas driller who explained "they didn't have a buyer [for the gas] that month."

But Geiger said that she'd already seen the signs of a slowdown, that rural streets once clogged with the massive trucks of the drilling firms were mostly empty now, while new motels that had been hastily thrown up or expanded to accommodate a flood of out-of-state workers had only a couple of cars in the parking lots.
Read more at the Philadelphia Inquirer.

US shale gas project 'biggest regret' for outgoing Shell boss
Outgoing Shell chief executive Peter Voser says in an interview with the Financial Times his biggest regret during his time at the company is the failure of the company’s huge bet on US shale gas.
The Financial Times says Shell has invested at least $24bn in so-called unconventional oil and gas in North America. But the investment has yet to pay off and in August Shell said it would carry out a ‘strategic review’ of its US shale activities.

‘Unconventionals did not exactly play out as planned,’ Voser is quoted as saying.

He also admitted exploration results in US shale beds had been disappointing. ‘We expected higher flow rates and therefore more scalability for a company like Shell,’ he said.
Read more at Dutch News.


Shale Bubble

We’re being told that – thanks to technological advances like hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling – the US is undergoing an energy revolution, leading us in a few short years to become once again the world’s biggest oil producer and an exporter of natural gas. According to the Oil & Gas Industry and their proponents, “fracking” will provide the US with energy security, low energy prices for the foreseeable future, more than a million jobs, and economic growth.

Pointing to record low natural gas prices and increased production, policymakers and the media on both sides of the political aisle, as well as investors and utilities, have bought the hype and are shifting their plans and proposals with the expectation that the shale revolution is here to stay.

The Reality is that the so-called shale revolution is nothing more than a bubble, driven by record levels of drilling, speculative lease & flip practices on the part of shale energy companies, fee-driven promotion by the same investment banks that fomented the housing bubble, and by unsustainably low natural gas prices. Geological and economic constraints – not to mention the very serious environmental and health impacts of drilling – mean that shale gas and shale oil (tight oil) are far from the solution to our energy woes.
See the full report at ShaleBubble.org 

US shale gas project 'biggest regret' for outgoing Shell boss

Monday 07 October 2013
Outgoing Shell chief executive Peter Voser says in an interview with the Financial Times his biggest regret during his time at the company is the failure of the company’s huge bet on US shale gas.
The FT says Shell has invested at least $24bn in so-called unconventional oil and gas in North America. But the investment has yet to pay off and in August Shell said it would carry out a ‘strategic review’ of its US shale activities.

‘Unconventionals did not exactly play out as planned,’ Voser is quoted as saying.
He also admitted exploration results in US shale beds had been disappointing. ‘We expected higher flow rates and therefore more scalability for a company like Shell,’ he said.
- See more at: http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2013/10/us_shale_gas_project_biggest_r.php#sthash.CNn5l8qf.6bLkEKok.dpuf

US shale gas project 'biggest regret' for outgoing Shell boss

Monday 07 October 2013
Outgoing Shell chief executive Peter Voser says in an interview with the Financial Times his biggest regret during his time at the company is the failure of the company’s huge bet on US shale gas.
The FT says Shell has invested at least $24bn in so-called unconventional oil and gas in North America. But the investment has yet to pay off and in August Shell said it would carry out a ‘strategic review’ of its US shale activities.

‘Unconventionals did not exactly play out as planned,’ Voser is quoted as saying.
He also admitted exploration results in US shale beds had been disappointing. ‘We expected higher flow rates and therefore more scalability for a company like Shell,’ he said.
- See more at: http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2013/10/us_shale_gas_project_biggest_r.php#sthash.CNn5l8qf.6bLkEKok.dpuf

FORUM: Shale Gas Potential in NY State [Update: 10.26]

[Click image to enlarge]

Printable Posters are Here

Map to the Presentation at Cornell University is Here

UPDATE - 10.26.2013: How much Shale Gas could be Produced in NY State?
Video - Chip Northrup interviewed on Capital Tonight 

Shale Gas Science is Topic of Visiting Professor

Dr. Anthony Ingraffea, from the Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Cornell University, will speak on: 

The Science of Shale Gas: The Latest Evidence on Leaky Wells, Emissions, and Implications for Policy .

• Thursday, October 3, 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM

• Canisius College, Montante Cultural Center, 2021 Main St, Buffalo 

Dr. Ingraffea will present scientific facts to consider in the debate over the use of hydraulic fracturing in natural gas extraction in New York State.

The event is free and open to the public.  

Parking: Science Hall Parking Ramp at the corner of Jefferson and E. Delvan Ave.

~ Sponsored by the Western New York Division of the American Chemical Society ~

Exerting Local Authority over Shale Gas Development

UB Geography Colloquium Series presents:

Susan Christopherson .
Professor, Dept. of City and Regional Planning,
Cornell University

A Vote of ‘No Confidence’? 
Why Local Governments Take Action in Response to Shale Gas Development

Friday, October 4, 2013, 3:15p.m.
WILKESON 145H (inside GIAL Computing Lab), UB North Campus, Amherst [Map]

Why has a local response to high volume hydraulic fracturing (HVHF) shale gas development emerged?  To understand why many New York communities have moved to exercise local authority or “home rule” over natural gas development, we examine how they came to understand (1) the risks attendant to HVHF, and (2) their strategic and regulatory options.  An answer to these questions looks at the concerns that have framed the public discussion, and at how key local actors evaluated industry and state government willingness or capacity to address those concerns. 

BIO:  Susan Christopherson is an economic geographer whose research and teaching focus on economic development, urban labor markets, and location patterns in service industries, particularly media industries. Her research includes both international and U.S.-policy-oriented projects. Her international research includes studies in Canada, Mexico, China, Germany, and Jordan as well as multi-country studies. In the past three years she has completed studies on advanced manufacturing in New York’s Southern Tier, the photonics industry in Rochester, the role of universities and colleges in revitalizing the upstate New York economy, and production trends affecting media industries in New York City. She has written more than 50 articles and 25 policy reports on topics in economic geography and economic development. Her current projects include studies of phoenix industries in old industrial regions and a comprehensive economic impact analysis of natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale in New York and Pennsylvania. Christopherson received her Ph.D. from the University of California-Berkeley.

Light refreshments will be served.

For more info on the Colloquium Series, contact Marion Werner <wernerm@buffalo.edu>.
 
THIS EVENT Co-SPONSORED by the GEOGRAPHY GRADUATE STUDENT ASSOCIATION (GGSA).

EVENT: Draw the Line -- Protect What We Love

Join 350.org, the Climate Reality Project, and concerned citizens in the Village of Lancaster to take part in a national day of action!  

 

WHEN: Saturday, September 21, 2013 at 11:00 AM

 

WHERE: Corner of Brookfield Place and Central Avenue, Village of Lancaster [Map].

 

We'll gather to Draw the Line by saying "NO" to the Tar Sands pipeline and dirty fossil fuel extraction methods like fracking.

 

We want to Protect What We Love -- our children, our families, our way of life -- all of which are threatened by increasingly dangerous and polluting fossil fuel usage. We need to urge our town, state and national governments to say "YES" to clean, renewable energy and energy efficiency.

 

Please bring signs with messages to go along with our theme.

 

Join in on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/632075496833304

 

Contact the organizer, Alison Schweichler, with any questions at (716) 698-5707 or email asch1006@yahoo.com.

Hydrofracking Updates

Yes, a Drilling Moratorium.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013 by: Times Union Editorial Board. 

Our opinion: The Legislature should pass a moratorium on fracking while multiple studies are under way.

Whether you feel that natural gas fracking is the economic salvation of New York or an environmental disaster waiting to happen, there is one indisputable fact about it: The science is not in. Not by a long shot. And that’s why a moratorium in New York makes sense.

State leaders who have vowed to let science guide their decision on whether to allow high-volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing could show they mean what they say by declaring that the idea is off the table at least until some serious study is done.

While the industry’s persistent public relations campaign has portrayed fracking as clean and safe, we simply don’t know if that’s true. At least five studies are under way or being considered on fracking as scientists and health researchers seek answers.

Read more at TimesUnion.com

Note: The New York Assembly has already voted to ban fracking for two more years.
The moratorium would last until May 15, 2015. In the meantime, the Assembly bill calls for the State University of New York to conduct an independent, comprehensive health review (A5424A-2013).

A similar bill to ban fracking for two more years was introduced by the Independent Democratic Conference in the Senate (S4236A-2013).
However, the GOP is against the moratorium and they prefer to wait instead for Governor Cuomo’s health commissioner to complete an ongoing review. Read more here.
 
UPDATE 4.9.2013 --  Letter: Governor Cuomo, insist on a drilling moratorium
To the editor of the Times Union -- Published Friday, April 5, 2013

On behalf of a bipartisan group of more than 635 local elected officials from all 62 counties across New York, we agree with the Times Union's editorial in support of a moratorium on fracking. Wisely, the Times Union cited a growing majority of New Yorkers who question the safety of fracking: "Safe? Prove it. We can wait."

We can — and must — hold off. Elected Officials to Protect New York, whose signatories represent more than 13.5 million New Yorkers, has long been calling for Gov. Andrew Cuomo to maintain the moratorium on fracking. An informed decision cannot be made until analyses have evaluated the health, economic and cumulative environmental impacts on local communities.

The facts and science are not in. New concerns arise weekly.  Read more here.

TAKE ACTION: Call Governor Cuomo at  518-474-8390 and let him know your opinion about hydrofracking in NY State.

3rd NY Town Wins in Court over Fracking Ban

By The Associated Press on March 19, 2013

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — A third upstate New York town has won a court challenge to its ban on natural gas drilling as two previous cases are about to be argued before a state appeals court.

Gas drilling company Lenape Resources, based in western New York, had sued the Livingston County town of Avon and the state Department of Environmental Conservation over the town's moratorium on drilling, saying the action threatened to put it out of business after it had operated in the town for decades. Lenape's owner, John Holko, also sought $50 million in damages. He named the Department of Environmental Conservation because he said the agency had a duty to stop towns from enacting local bans.

On March 15, Acting Supreme Court Justice Robert Wiggins in Livingston County ruled against Lenape on all counts. He cited Court of Appeals precedents as well as decisions in favor of local bans in the Upstate towns of Dryden and Middlefield.

Read more at The Post-Standard's Syracuse.com

Note: The basis for NY Supreme Court rulings upholding the gas-drilling bans in the Towns of Dryden and Middlefield was covered in my earlier post here (February 27, 2012) .

Sierra Club Blasts 'Sustainable Shale' Center's Partnership Between Industry And Environmental Groups

AP  |  By KEVIN BEGOS Posted: 03/21/2013

PITTSBURGH (AP) — The Sierra Club and some other environmental groups are harshly criticizing a new partnership that aims to create tough new standards for fracking.

The criticism Thursday came a day after two of the nation's biggest oil and gas companies made peace with some national and regional environmental groups, agreeing to go through an independent review of their shale oil and gas drilling operations in the Northeast.

If Shell Oil, Chevron Appalachia and other companies are found to be abiding by a list of stringent measures to protect the air and water from pollution, they will receive the blessing of the new Pittsburgh-based Center for Sustainable Shale Development, created by environmentalists and the energy industry.

But some are questioning whether a partnership between environmentalists and the oil and gas industry should exist at all.

Read more at the Huffington Post

NOTE 1: "Sustainable shale" is an oxymoron, like "clean coal."  How about "sustainable wind" or "sustainable sunlight"... that works!
NOTE 2: Even Pro-frackers don't like this industry-enviro "partnership." See MarcellusDrilling.com

Collapse of Salt Mine serves as Cautionary Tale on Fracking

By Margaret Wooster
Special to The Buffalo News - 03/17/2013

This cautionary tale is relevant to one of the most important decisions confronting New York State in our time: whether to permit the construction of tens of thousands of new high-volume hydrofracking gas wells across the southern half of our state.

Read more at BuffaloNews.com

EPA Announces Expert Panel to Review Fracking Study

WASHINGTON | Mon Mar 25, 2013

(Reuters) - The U.S. environmental regulator has selected experts in fields ranging from well-drilling to toxicology to review a highly anticipated report on the natural gas and oil extraction method commonly known as fracking.

The Environmental Protection Agency's science advisory board on Monday named 31 experts from universities, scientific labs and companies to review the agency's landmark hydraulic fracturing study that is expected to be delivered in 2014.

The study, first requested by Congress in 2010, may prove pivotal in the government's regulation of fracking that has unlocked generations' worth of oil and gas supplies.

Read more here.

Click here to view a list of Members of the Hydraulic Fracturing Research Advisory Panel

To view the Executive Summary of the Progress Report on the EPA hydraulic fracturing study (December 2012), click here.

Fracking Forum – Impacts on Environment, Health and Society

Join panelists, Rita Yelda, Sarah Buckley, David Kowalski, and Robert Cieselski, who will present talks and answer questions about diverse issues surrounding shale gas extraction and high volume hydrofracking.

• WHEN: March 21, 2013, 7:00pm-9:00pm

• WHERE: Prendergast Library, 509 Cherry St., Jamestown [Map]

Becky Nystrom – Moderator
Sarah Buckley – Fracking Basics (the process of fracking, from wellpad to pipeline)   
David Kowalski – Environmental and Health Issues (an analysis of industry-made arguments vs. other studies and evidence)   
Robert Cieselski – Leasing and Legal Issues (signing considerations, Compulsory Integration, landowner rights, flipping, impacts on mortgages, insurance) and Renewable Alternatives to Shale Gas
Rita Yelda – Fracking in New York State (what has occurred the last four years and where we are at now)

For speaker bio's and links to articles about fracking, click here.

NEW SOLUTIONS: Concerns Related to Shale Gas Extraction

The journal New Solutions: A Journal of Environmental and Occupational Health Policy has just released a special issue. It covers concerns related to shale gas extraction with respect to scientific, economic, social, environmental and health policy.

The issue opens with an Editorial entitled "An Energy Policy that Provides Clean and Green Power" by Craig Slatin and Charles Levenstein. They write:

  Now shale gas extraction conducted through the technological process commonly referred to as “fracking” is touted by the oil and gas industry as the next great energy boon. They tell us that gas will be so plentiful that it will answer all of our energy-related problems. Best yet, it will end the unemployment crisis that lingers past the Great Recession, leading to millions of jobs over the next several decades. Its promoters claim that we can have energy independence and a fuel that burns cleaner than coal—while they spread denial that the threat of catastrophic climate change is real or has much to do with human activity.

Let’s not be deceived: shale gas extraction will neither fulfill the prophesies nor be useful in the transition to just, democratic, and ecologically sustainable economies across the globe. It is business as usual. It is owned and operated by industries with more than a century’s legacy of greed, corruption, war provocation, pollution, illness, injury and death, environmental degradation, and a steady stream of propaganda and lobbying to limit its regulation by governments.

One claim of industry propaganda is backed by a reference to a publication from an independent source. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reported that the Marcellus Shale deposit “contains about 84 trillion cubic feet of undiscovered, technically recoverable natural gas," a figure which is 80 percent less than that supplied to the U.S. Energy Information Agency by industry consultants.

The Editorial concludes with a call for the need of a national energy policy that addresses climate change and protects human health and welfare:

Whatever short-term assistance the American economy gains from the continued use of fossil fuels, the highest priority must be placed on establishing a national energy policy, coordinated with an international set of energy policies, that aims for immediate measures to avert catastrophic climate change and establish a transition toward producing and delivering clean, green, and sufficient energy as part of the foundation for sustainable development. Attention to the health and welfare of workers and communities affected by these changes must be an essential priority of this new energy policy.

This special issue of New Solutions was organized by guest editors Robert Oswald, a Cornell professor, and Michelle Bamberger, a practicing veternarian. Many will recognize these individuals as the authors of a 2012 report entitled “Impacts of Gas Drilling on Human and Animal Health." Oswald and Bamberger also wrote the introduction for the special issue.

Eleven articles in the issue cover scientific, economic, social, environmental and health policy. Authors include experts, such as Jannette Barth, Wilma Subra and Ronald Bishop, who have testified on aspects of shale gas extraction before the New York State legislature. Also, Anthony Ingraffea, Cornell professor of civil and environmental engineering, is interviewed in one of the articles.  

The entire issue spans 221 pages and the PDF is available here.

New Solutions: A Journal of Environmental and Occupational Health Policy  seeks to deliver "authoritative responses to perplexing problems, with a worker’s voice, an activist’s commitment, a scientist’s approach, and a policy-maker’s experience." Journal articles are "written for both the academic and educated lay audience." Its the Journal intention "to affect the public health policy discussion and shake up the policy debate." Articles are peer reviewed using a process described here.

Should U.S. Expand Fracking to Export Shale Gas?

Critics cite need for information on impacts of expanded shale gas production on human health, communities, environment and domestic prices.   

Doctors Urge U.S. to Block Gas Export Terminals
By Jon Hurdle

More than 100 physicians urged the Obama administration on Thursday not to approve the construction of liquefied natural gas [LNG] export terminals until more is known about the health effects of hydraulic fracturing, the drilling process that has opened the way for a big increase in domestic gas production.

Until policymakers and public health officials determine whether fracking is dangerous to human health, they argue, the government should not allow the development of the 15 new export terminals that have been proposed by the gas industry. The government has so far approved one export terminal, proposed by Cheniere Energy, in Louisiana.

The demand for exports has risen from a recent boom in domestic production resulting from the use of fracking in combination with horizontal drilling, which has allowed the industry to exploit vast shale gas reserves at an affordable cost. Energy companies are also lured by sharply higher natural gas prices overseas.

Link to the full article at the New York Times Green Blog.

Why Policymakers and the Public Need Fair Disclosure Before Exports of Fracked Gas Start
By Craig Segall, Staff Attorney, Sierra Club Environmental Law Program.

Exporting American Liquefied Natural Gas [LNG] to the world market would spur unconventional natural gas production across the country, increasing pollution and disrupting landscapes and communities. Deciding whether to move forward is among the most pressing environmental and energy policy decisions facing the nation. Yet, as the Department of Energy (DOE) considers whether to greenlight gas exports of as much as 45% of current U.S. gas production — more gas than the entire domestic power industry burns in a year — it has refused to disclose, or even acknowledge, the environmental consequences of its decisions.

Gas exports would transform the energy landscape and communities across the country. We owe ourselves an open national conversation to test whether they are in the public interest. We need to look before we leap.

Download the Sierra Club report here (44 page PDF).

Coalition Urges SUNY Trustees to Close UB Shale Institute

 

After reviewing the University at Buffalo’s report to the SUNY Board of Trustees on its recently-created Shale Institute (a.k.a. the Shale Resources and Society Institute), UB CLEAR, an organization of University at Buffalo (UB) faculty, staff, students, and supporters called on the Board to:

• Make public all documents related to founding, funding, and governance of the Shale Institute
• Formally recall the Institute’s first publication
• Close the Shale Institute

In a comprehensive 14-page response to the University at Buffalo report, UB CLEAR detailed the many missteps the Shale Institute made – and the refusal of the UB Administration to recognize these missteps in the report to the SUNY Board of Trustees.

Among their criticisms of the Shale Institute:

• The Institute’s founding lecture series was underwritten and tainted by secret oil and gas company money, and it’s present and future funding remains mysterious.
• The Shale Institute’s directors have conflicts of interest between their academic work and their extensive consulting work with oil and gas companies.
• The Institute offers corporate donors an improper governance role and privileged access.
• The Institute’s initial publication was and continues to be marred by false claims of peer review, undisclosed corporate ties of the authors, an unscholarly pro-fracking agenda, and major factual errors, never acknowledged or corrected.

“Making mistakes isn’t the issue—mistakes are a given for scholars,” said Jim Holstun, Professor of English at University at Buffalo and Chair of UB CLEAR. “But doggedly standing by mistakes, as have the authors and UB administrators, carries us from the realm of rigorous and legitimate scholarship to the realm of public relations and policy advocacy.” 

“It is time for UB administrators remember that they are employees of the citizens of New York, not PR flacks for potential corporate donors with no genuine interest in education and scholarship,” added Holstun.  

In April 2012, the University at Buffalo formed the Shale Resources and Society Institute. The Shale Institute came under fire in May, when it rushed out a pro-hydrofracking report without benefit of peer review.  University of Buffalo professors have questioned the independence of the Institute, a review by the Public Accountability Initiative revealed fundamental errors in the report, and news accounts detailed undisclosed ties of its authors to the oil and gas industry. On 12 September, the SUNY Board of Trustees directed the University at Buffalo Administration to report on the Shale Institute. On 27 September, UB President Satish K. Tripathi delivered his report to the Trustees.

UB Administration's claims that no concerns were raised by "the relevant scientific community" about the report or the data used in developing the report’s conclusion were addressed in a letter to the editor of the university's newspaper by David Kowalski, Professor Emeritus in the Cellular & Molecular Biology Program, Roswell Park Graduate Division of UB, and member of UB CLEAR.

In the letter, Kowalski indicated that objectivity of UB Shale Institute report was compromised in favor of the gas industry and existing state regulations. He stated that the report should have been peer reviewed through an academic journal. "Scientists rely on the rigorous and critical peer-review process to ensure research integrity," he said. "The authors should have been held to the same high standards of peer review as the UB faculty."

About UB CLEAR - Coalition for Leading Ethically in Academic Research:
UB CLEAR is a coalition of University at Buffalo faculty, students, alums, and other community members who have been working together since May to bring transparency to the Shale Institute. Today, 29 October, they formally responded to the UB administration in a comprehensive and thoroughly-documented report sent to the SUNY Trustees: “UB CLEAR Response to the 27 September Report by UB President Satish K. Tripathi regarding UB’s Shale Resources and Society Institute.” They charge that the UB administration report is evasive and non-responsive to the Trustees’ request, providing yet another example of pro-fracking propaganda in academic guise.