MUST WATCH VIDEO:
NASA climate scientist Dr James Hansen speaks, Feb 2013
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MUST SEE OVERHEAD PHOTO:
SATELLITE IMAGE OF TWO FRACK PADS USING
10.6 MILLION GALLONS OF FRESH WATER
https://twitter.com/fractivist/status/348986881972793344/photo/1
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| Bluestone rig road rocks laid down so that heavy frack trucks won't sink into the earth. Photo Jane Prettyman |
by Anne Willard, Life and Times of the Upper Delaware Dec 14, 2012
I have a concession to make. I think we need natural gas as a bridge fuel. But what I find infuriating is that the people in government and industry who say that we need natural gas as a bridge fuel don’t behave remotely as though they really believe it. They behave as though it’s a resource that we should use as exhaustively as possible for as long as possible.
Read more on what a real "bridge" might look like and bookmark "Life and Times of the Upper Delaware." The author is the award-winning former editorial writer for The River Reporter in Narrowsburg, NY
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Jason Mark, Earth Island Journal, 8-21-12
When it comes to the greenhouse effect, methane is often said to be 21 times more heat-trapping that carbon dioxide. But that's not in the time-scale we should be using to think about how to tackle greenhouse gas emissions.
Actually, any methane (CH4) released today is at least 56 times more heat-trapping than a molecule of C02 also released today. And because of the way it reacts in the atmosphere, the number is probably even higher, according to research conducted by Drew Shindell, a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Center. So why is the “21 times” figure the one that gets bandied about? Because methane breaks down much faster than carbon dioxide. While CO2 remains in the atmosphere for at least a century (and probably much, much longer, according to Stanford’s Ken Caldeira, CH4 lasts only about a dozen years. When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had to come up with a way for comparing different greenhouse gases, it decided to use a century baseline to calculate a molecule’s “global warming potential.”
Why does it matter? Because we don’t have a century to get serious about the impacts of runaway greenhouse gas emissions. Climate change is upon us now. And we appear to be approaching some irrevocable tipping points that will create powerful negative feedback loops, the most worrisome being the release of methane stores at the bottom of the ocean and locked into sub-Arctic permafrost.
Carbon dioxide’s longevity means that the warming we’re experiencing now is actually the result of fossil fuel burning that happened a generation ago. And the emissions we’re causing today won’t be felt for decades to come. At our current rate of emissions, we’ll be toast 100 years from now.
What if we were to use the IPCC’s 20-year comparison instead of its 100-year comparison? For starters, it would force us to get much more serious about tackling the sources of methane emissions including a major source of emissions emerging lately with shale gas drilling, added on top of the old sources. Here in the US, the top methane sources are the decomposition of wastes in landfills, agriculture (from ruminant digestion), and leaks from natural gas drilling and transmission. Our new understanding of methane as a major aggravator of global warming and climate change in a much shorter term (20 years rather than 100 years) requires us to get smarter about capturing methane at landfills, reduce the market incentives that encourage Americans’ meat-heavy diets, and ensure that methane isn’t leaking from fracking operations. (Read full article and see next item about the Howarth report)
Shale Gas: Climate menace?
Speaking of methane leaks and releases in shale gas production and consumption, a groundbreaking peer-reviewed report was released in 2011 by Dr Robert Howarth and his colleagues at Cornell, showing that because of these methane releases into the atmosphere, natural gas, while "clean burning" in our kitchen stoves at that very last use, in its full production lifecycle is not at all "clean" as repeatedly touted by slick gas industry TV commercials. Howarth and his Cornell team assert that shale gas is probably as dirty as coal in its aggravating effect on greenhouse -- and probably worse. Read the report and watch this brief clip of Dr Howarth (by PC editor Jane Prettyman) speaking about his team's findings after Dr Howarth testified to the EPA in Binghamton NY in 2010. These results make sense in light of the article by Jason Mark above about the proper way of viewing the situation not in terms of 100 years but 20 years.
See 2011 report on shale gas greenhouse footprint, an independent peer-reviewed study by Cornell's Robert Howarth, Anthony Ingraffea and their colleagues.
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PHOTO BY JANE PRETTYMAN
Welcome to the Industrial Zone
PHOTO BY JANE PRETTYMAN
Welcome to the Industrial Zone
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| A mere 90 miles west of Honesdale PA (former home of PC) this dusty industrial scene is coming toward us -- fast. More photos are found when you watch the video "Bradford CountyUSA" in right sidebar of this page |
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What the gas industry doesn't
want you to see
Aerial photos of shale gas well pads all over PA
The aerial photographers at Marcellus-Shale.us have allowed us permission to show you a selection of images from their extraordinary website. Best bet is to take time to explore their entire collection of hundreds of images along with a library full of information about shale gas extraction. Meanwhile here is a quick visual glimpse of a few aerial photos to give you an idea of what we're dealing with in terms of the scale of earthen disruption for these gigantic well pads and impoundments pits. Some gas companies in PA are now voluntarily using water recycling and reuse in certain areas rather than the wastewater pits you see in these pictures; the majority of wells in PA, however, up until recently employed wastewater pits with plastic liners. Some of them create toxic stink pits (see last two photos below plus video).
This first photo is most recent, showing several well sites drilled by CTX Energy within feet of the Beaver Run Reservoir in Westmoreland County PA, source of drinking water for 150,000 people. The shocker here is how close these wells are to the reservoir. Go to the Marcellus-Shale.us link to read details about Beaver Run, including the fact that at least one of the impoundment pits for flowback waste water has no plastic liner, meaning its contents can seep into the earth and migrate to the reservoir. How were these sitings permitted by the State of PA?
Marcellus-Shale.us carries a news report that Consol Energy's plans to drill 6 more wells along the reservoir, bringing to 60 the number of Consol Energy wells in the vicinity.
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| Beaver Run Reservoir gas wells of CTX Energy, 3 in sight, Westmorland County, PA (Photo courtesy of marcellus-shale.us) |
Below are additional photos from Marcellus-Shale.us
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| Drilling pad and pit construction on a farm. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
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| Multiple impoundment pits for a new drilling location in PA. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
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| Long view of well pad and wastewater pit in Buffalo PA, built by Range Resources near Wotring Rd. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
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| Same wastewater pit as above, viewed from other side near Wotring Rd in Buffalo PA, known locally as "the stink pit," with plastic liner. Notice huge scale. See video below. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
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| Photo by JP |
Design by Jane Prettyman
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EDITOR OF PUBLIC COMMENT, 2010, updated 2012
Fracturing the Shale Industry Talking Points
Welcome to Public Comment, a site that champions the public interest and the environment.
This post addresses the industry and political propaganda surrounding the headlong push to develop shale gas like there's no tomorrow while pretending it's a "bridge" to a renewable energy future while making little effort to build that bridge. We still allow federal subsidies for carbon energy -- what's that about? We should be shifting subsidies from carbon to renewables and tripling or quadrupling them. But no, we're not doing that. Here's what we could be doing, according to someone who thinks about these issues in the Upper Delaware River Valley, take a look.
The development of natural gas/shale gas as well as other dirty energy including nuclear seems to lack a matched level of effort going into clean/sustainable energy. Industry is trying (successfully) to fool us into believing shale gas is "clean and safe," indeed, they say, it's "so clean it's green." Even President Obama thinks shale is clean and coal is clean. They're not.
The carbon era crawls to a close amid pervasive economic malaise in capital lending while drillers and miners search desperately for the last vestiges of dirty energy, scraping the bottom of the barrel in extreme drilling too deep in the oceans to be safe (see BP's Gulf disasters) and high-pressure deep-well injection of millions of gallons of toxic chemicals into the earth to break up shale in horizontal fracturing ("fracking") to release gas. The frenzy is sold to the public as vital to "energy independence," yet shale gas is so prevalent and demand so weak that the price has plummeted and it's more profitable to export liquified shale gas overseas, meaning the USA is being exploited by foreign interests as a source for carbon minerals (oil, coal and shale gas) -- so much for "energy independence" -- while the residents of drilling and mining areas in the USA absorb the consequences in human health effects of ruined air, water and climate.
Shale gas is also sold on a supposed windfall in "jobs" but they're boom-bust jobs with lousy benefits, no union protections, and more workers from out of state than indiginous. Workers are exposed to polluted air and water and extreme danger on the drilling rigs themselves. These are not the jobs you wish for your son or daughter or yourself.
Welcome to the Third World -- in America.
There are many causes for this situation, one large one being a corrupted political process in the financing of election which includes corruption of Democrats as well as Republicans. Mr Obama is championing shale gas and other dirty energy production just as energetically as his Republican compatriots, because he and his administration have been suckered by lobbyists into believing the gas industry's siren song about promised jobs and the "clean energy" of shale gas. Mr Obama also gains a great deal of campaign cash from the dirty energy business. He's avid for nuclear, too, despite the Fukayama disaster and latest news (May 2012) that Reactor 4 (and all the other reactors) are poised to melt down in the next moderate earthquake and spread a gigantic cancer-causing radiation release over all animal entire species over the whole earth -- including humans and our sweet little deer in the top right corner of this page. But no worries, it'll take a few years for cancer symptoms to show up.
That's our Prez! Whatta boy! Give us one of those sunny smiles and we'll be fine!
Overall, it's not a pretty picture. The economic crisis has left us with crippled financial maneuverability to shift to renewable energy. We are told we need "energy and jobs" while complaints about toxicity of drilling for carbon fuels are disparaged. Citizens who speak up at city council meetings are guilted about "jobs" while most of the jobs in NE rural areas of the US are imported from Texas, Oklahoma, and Georgia creating havoc in local housing by causing huge rent increases and homelessness for poor and elderly residents; increased crime (domestic violence, rapes, public drunkenness, car accidents, etc), increased traffic, working for low pay with no union protections, while the local impact fees in PA, for example, are too low to cover the cost of dealing with these unplanned-for impacts.
Much of this story is known to our readers. We’re searching for a “bridge fuel” to get beyond oil and coal, and our political leaders are persuaded by industry PR talking points that “clean and safe” natural gas is the answer. If industry and political leaders were honest they would admit the sort of bridge we have in shale gas is a rope bridge in the jungle, shaky, temporary and dangerous. We are not being encouraged to get off the rope bridge but to stay on it for as long as possible while dirty energy industries extract every last penny of profit, taking ever greater and more extreme risks.
The Delaware River Basin is under a mortorium against issuing water withdrawal permits for fracking until DRBC rules are approved by the four state governors and the White House. Odds are the moritorium will be lifted later this year. NY state is finishing its regs and will likely start issuing drilling permits later this year. Meanwhile several towns in NY state have banned shale gas drilling as of May 2012, to their great credit, and a NY state supreme court ruling is awaited on keeping those bans in place. But the rest of NY state and all of PA seem happy as clams to sacrifice their children's health for the barbaric practice of hydraulic fracturing in exchange for a pocketful of dollars from drillers and a few crappy temporary jobs. PA Governor Corbett (known affectionately as Gov Corporate) won his election with 85% of his funding from the shale gas industry, and the drillers are getting exactly the leniency in regulation they paid for.
A perfect example is Act 13 passed in PA in late 2011 which lays down a blanket statewide zoning ordinance written by shale gas lobbyists and favorable to drillers, usurping local municipal land use (zoning) authority, otherwise known as home rule.
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| Photo by Aaron Deemer, "Shale Country" |
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| A guy thing? Photo by Aaron Deemer, "Shale Country" |
Public Comment stands for strapping government to the mast of its better judgment to protect the public interest. We don't have much leverage except for the public service of invaluable objective facts provided in the blogroll of "Our Teachers" in Shale School in the right column. And we can deconstruct the narrative of PR siren songs upon which shale gas development is based. This we will attempt to do here and later we'll gather elements of a new narrative -- a new story -- for alternative energy development in its place. Heaven knows sustainables need their own marketing on a par with -- no, better than -- their opposition.
The bridging to sustainable energy would be insulation, conservation and efficiency, plus fast-track progress on emerging clean/green energy options. "Bridging" is a matter of political and public will neither of which is very robust at the moment. Instead, "bridging" is being discussed as a means not of getting to the green side of the stream but staying on the carbon side longer, thus we have more offshore oil drilling per Pres. Obama'e energy policy and the carbon natural gas pitch over the Marcellus Shale in the East and all the other shale "plays" in 34 states.
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This is the honest "bridge" built on shale gas and
other carbon fuels in our transition to renewables:
Temporary, shaky and dangerous, to get across as quickly as possible |
The Propaganda Game: Verbal geniuses, slick words and rosy pictures
There are two documents that readers of Public Comment can puruse which articulate the pro-drilling issue best. The first is a statement to the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) by a large coalition of property owners in the Upper Delaware River region. These people have all signed lucrative shale gas drilling leases and stand to make small and large fortunes on gas extraction. The second is an op ed column by Honesdale PA entrepreneur Tom Shepstone (who has since taken a position as a paid lobbyist working for Energy In Depth to promote gas drilling), published in early Sept 2010 in The River Reporter, arguing that far from massive disruption and industrialization of the land and ruination of water and air, hydrofracking with horizontal drilling leaves "an incredibly small footprint" as it affords access to the same volume of natural gas as previously accessed by multiple wells. He argues that commercial development of land or construction of subdivisions would be far more disruptive and polluting to water, land and air than shale gas extraction which, instead, leaves "open space." Shepstone concludes by saying:
Nothing has so little impact on the land we treasure as a finished gas well. You can drive through the beautiful Finger Lakes and see them everywhere in the middle of cornfields and vineyards. If, like the people of that region, we’re serious about farmland and open space protection, we, too, need this source of additional income. Natural gas will save the farm. It’s that simple.Ah, that sounds wonderful, doesn't it? HF combines all wells into one pad but he forgets to remind us that we still have to deal with all the environmental effects of all those wells which radiate out in all directions like spokes on a wheel and which use up to 7.5 million gallons of our river water per day. The latter alone in a huge impact. Mr Shepstone is completely disingenuous. He skips the impacts to the land in erosion, habitate disruption, air pollution, water use, etc. caused by shale gas drilling that are far more significant than impacts of suburban development. He skips the risk to drinking water caused by fracking and mishandling of highly toxic (and often radioactive) flowback waste water. He never mentions the high volume diesel truck traffic to service each well pad hurtling along narrow country roads (ruining the roads, sometimes repaired by drillers, sometimes costs absorbed by the state while road construction stirs up dust and clogs traffic on a semi-permanent basis). Diesel frack trucks spew thousands of tons of toxic exhaust fumes into the air containing benzene and of poisonous ingredients.
These factors do not add up to a "small footprint." The glib Mr Shepstone is surely aware but never mentions the negative impact of shale gas production (methane) on greenhouse effect, global warming and climate change because, in its full lifecycle, methane (87% of NG), a potent greenhouse gas, is leaked or vented into the atmosphere, making NG nearly as "dirty" as coal if not worse (Howarth 2011). Shepstone ignores all this for his pretty little footprint of a well pad.
Both articles rely on gas industry technology and "best management practices" (BMP) more than merited considering that negligent performance and lack of regulatory oversight are factors that allows accidents and shoddy drilling, leading to contamination and pollution. That's a problem of human and corporate error as well as regulatory error, so shale gas drilling needs to be carefully regulated, inspected and monitored (See our "Rig Log" section for what the "incredibly small footprint" looks like and watch 9-minute video by the author, "Bradford County USA").
Shale gas extraction is proceeding apace, nothing can stop it short of the public and political leaders having a midnight conversion and waking up or, heaven forbid, an event of massive pollution of drinking water large enough to stop the presses and make people stop and think and stop the manic shale gas fracking frenzy. This is not a hopeful hope, however, witness Mr Obama's renewed promotion of nuclear plant development after the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl. Corruption does not learn.
What follows is an overview of the immense creativity of PR by the NG industry in their talking points. This is, in part, what we're up against in formulating an effective response to awaken the public to counteraction.
In this post on Public Comment, we drill down below the surface of PR talking points that rationalize actions. They are part of a narrative that gives us "reasons why." Strip them away (or fracture them) and one wonders why one acts the way one does. We in the pro-environment, pro-green energy, get-beyond-carbon movement have our talking points, too, although they're not very effective -- yet.
Industry's pitch: The gas gold rush is creating jobs; bringing wealth to working class families from gas leases and production royalties; helping farmers keep and work their land and buy new equipment. "To farm without debt, what a dream that would be," said a farmer in Sullivan County, NY. Relieved compassion goes out to dairy farmers for the lease royalties they are felt to deserve after decades of hardship. Gas development is causing positive economic effects to ripple through the shale regions. These points are all true. We can parse the number, quality and longevity (or brevity) of jobs, the built-in non-union nature of the jobs, the wages, the healthcare benefits of workers (or lack thereof) -- but generally these statements are true and we don't begrudge them.
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| Photo by Aaron Deemer, "Shale Country" |
Of course, there are options other than leasing to gas companies such as developing wind farms, solarizing homes and other solar projects and renewable energy options, with jobs associated with their construction, operation and maintenance. There's conservation, insulation and efficiency education. These are jobs, too. Since banks are not making loans, direct loans from the federal government to finance small and large-scale renewable projects could be done (See this Scientific American article for ideas to transition within 20 years to nearly full renewables). Solarizing the military and most government agencies would bring down the "cost per" on SVCs; all government vehicles should be hybrids. But there’s little popular news coverage of such options and little will among national leaders (beyond lip-service) to prioritize them. Why? Partly because of corruption of leaders by the O&G lobby and partly because renewables have few talented voices in the PR talking point department and weak political leadership to express them.
"Shale Country"
Before we get started on fracturing gas industry talking points, first let's take a look at what we're up against in a sophisticated PR effort called Shale Country directed by the same man who heads a foundation with the Orwellian name of "Clean Skies." This marketing creation was founded by Aubrey K. McClendon, the billionaire CEO of Oklahoma-based Chesapeake Energy Corporation, a major shale gas producer and one of the top sellers of natural gas nationwide.
Clean Skies established the Clean Skies Network (largely dismantled since this essay was penned in 2010 after its use was fulfilled in launching the shale craze), a media arm consisting of videos pretending to be "newscasts" to promote natural gas as the best thing slice sliced bread if only by inference. Notabn;y in a cute trick, they said little that was bad about NG while reporting negative news about oil and coal, created a kind of competition among coal, oil and shale gas with shale gas the winner in their promotions. They even created a TV arm called -- guess what? -- Shale.tv around 2007 (now dismantled in 2011), although shale gas was apparently folded into broader Clean Skies Network “news coverage” set up as a lobbying device to influence Congress and the White House and directed around the Internet to help convince local communities and landowners that shale gas drilling is good for you.
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| Photo by Aaron Deemer, "Shale Country" |
Clean Skies bills itself as promoting "clean natural gas and renewables." Within their closed-loop fake-journalism media world they call themselves the “energy and environment network.” This coupling is quite cunning. Clean Skies even offered “full coverage” of the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference which is ironic because research of Cornell’s Robert Howarth (more below) strongly suggests that cumulative methane leaks from the full shale gas A-Z lifecycle are almost as bad as emission of CO2 from burning of coal and worse than diesel for contributing to greenhouse effect, global warming and climate change. What kind of "bridge fuel" is that?
After studying video news reports from the Energy News Center in Washington DC (such as the Energy Report of Aug 2010, since taken down) and Clean Skies News reports, our guess was that Clean Skies was positioning natural gas to triangulate against oil and coal competitively as the supposed 'clean carbon alternative' and tying NG with renewables as Clean Skies sees the light of the renewable energy future and wishes to benefit by the reflected – “clean” -- even almost "green" renewable future that would include a decidedly non-renewable, decidedly dirty energy form called shale gas. It's a carefully constructed perceptual triangulation that depends on a Big Lie and leaves natural gas looking pretty – or at least “clean” -- to millions not paying close attention in the rush to develop shale gas.
Quite smart PR wise. You can imagine how well this subtle crossover from clean to green works with a few smiles over clinking ice cubes in the schmooze circuit of lobbyists' cocktail parties. Smiles emanating from a bemused sense of having gotten away with it.
And they nearly have.
For the NG industry, now a burgeoning global market, it's all about projecting the image of "clean." True, NG is cleaner-burning than oil or coal as it leaves less soot residue but they can (PR-wise) virtually ignore the methane problem because methane is invisible, yet methane is part of NG's "dirtiness" in relation to worsening the greenhouse effect. Some people don't believe there is a greenhouse effect or any problem with global warming as a result.
(By the way, “renewables” for Clean Skies also include nuclear which they seem to happily embrace. Radiation is invisible too).
On the Internet, Clean Skies' masterful creation, Shale Country, knows how to present itself PR-wise, being contrite up front about shale gas accidents, water pollution and spills, all very disarming in advance. Shale Country brings us an affecting array of average country folks who consider shale gas extraction on their land a blessing. Study the site; it's brilliantly done by the best PR people in the business. This is what we who question shale gas drilling are facing:
"Meet the people of Shale Country. Hear their voices. See their faces. To spend just a moment with them is to witness their connection to the land and to each other."Can't beat that. Nearly brings tears to our eyes.
Run your cursor over their photos to hear their voices and a dozen endearing talking points in one big cluster. Some are of their statements are unarguable ("We have to get off of coal and oil. It's a no-brainer"). Some are arguable indeed ("Natural gas is the cleanest product we could take advantage of"). This is only technically true in the way shale gas burns without much ask residue but ignores the entire dirty production process full of all sorts of pollution and contamination and methane leaks. If Robert Howarth is correct, shale gas is as dirty as coal for electricity generation and probably dirtier; coal is what we're trying to beat. Shale gas is worse than diesel fuel in trucks and buses. This leaves us with a whole new question:
Beyond coal and oil and natural gas lies what?
This is an opportunity for a new narrative to promote clean non-carbon alternative energy. This is an opening for sustainable energy to come up the inside track. We're boxed in to a situation where we do need to continue using carbon energy like natural gas to develop alternative fuels but the hope of this website is that we view shale gas, given its detriments to human health and the environment, as a short bridge, an unstable, temporary and dangerous rope bridge in the jungle, and not a causeway that never ends.
The "Clean Skies" people who created the PR campaign of Shale Country know what they're doing, including calling themselves Clean Skies when in fact shale gas extraction increases air pollution and ground-level ozone/haze/smog (see Endocrine Disruption Exchange and the HBO film "Gasland") in the course of its full production lifecycle. These features are "clean" only in the wild imagination of copy writers of industry talking points. We once used the term "Oilwellian" to describe BP's "ignorance is strength" style of Newspeak communication. This is Gaswellian.
Why would Clean Slies and its Shale Country website go to such lengths to create this PR image? The major objective, we believe, is to reduce or avoid regulation of the gas industry by portraying shale gas as clean and safe, the two core talking points we tackle here.
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| Impoundment pit close up, yet workers and tank trucks are tiny, sucking out wastewater through hoses. Notice plastic liner. See the video story behind this "stink pit" elsewhere on this site. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
"America's shale gas plays give the country new options for using natural gas to reduce our dependency on oil to power trucks and buses, and to generate electricity with 60% less global warming pollution than coal." (from Shale Country)
This is powerful talking point. And it's wrong.
Natural gas used in trucks and buses (large enough for storage) is cleaner-burning than oil for CO2 production, true, and it reduces our dependence on oil, which is good as far as it goes. However, NG is mostly methane, a potent greenhouse gas (GHG). Before its burning stage, leaks of methane into the atmosphere in the course of NG's entire lifecycle (extraction, piping, shipping, refining and end use) are potentially large enough to come close to offsetting the supposed beneficial effects that differentiate NG from coal in electricity generation, per Prof Robert Howarth of Cornell who also believes NG is clearly worse than diesel to power trucks and buses for increasing greenhouse effect and global warming.
It's the methane leaks, stupid!
Methane, with the chemical formula CH4, makes up about 87% of natural gas. Prof. Howarth estimates 1.5% of NG consumed is leaked into the atmosphere; government scientists and gas industry officials think it’s probably higher.
In fact, using natural gas rather than diesel in vehicles could actually increase climate change, says Robert Howarth, professor of ecology and environmental biology at Cornell University. "You're aggravating global warming more if you switch," he says.
Howarth is basing his conclusion on a preliminary analysis that includes not only the amount of carbon dioxide that comes out of a tailpipe when you burn diesel and natural gas, but also the impact of natural gas leaks. Methane, the main component of natural gas, is much more effective at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, so even small amounts of it contribute significantly to global warming. When you factor this in, natural gas could be significantly worse than diesel, he says. Using natural gas would emit the equivalent of 33 grams of carbon dioxide per megajoule. Using petroleum fuels [like diesel] would emit the equivalent of just 20 grams of carbon dioxide per megajoule.From Dr. Howarth's preliminary study (April 2010):
Natural gas is being widely advertised and promoted as a clean burning fuel that produces less greenhouse gas emissions than coal when burned. While it is true that less carbon dioxide is emitted from burning natural gas than from burning coal per unit of energy generated, the combustion emissions are only part of story and the comparison is quite misleading. A complete consideration of all emissions from using natural gas seems likely to make natural gas far less attractive than oil and not significantly better than coal in terms of the consequences for global warming.
. . . Until better estimates are generated and rigorously reviewed, society should be wary of claims that natural gas is a desirable fuel in terms of the consequences on global warming. Far better would be to rapidly move towards an economy based on renewable fuels. Recent studies indicate the U.S. and the world could rely 100% on such green energy sources within 20 years if we dedicate ourselves to that course. See Jacobson & Delucchi (2009), A Path to Sustainable Energy by 2030, Scientific American 301: 58-65.As Dr. Howarth notes, methane is a powerful greenhouse gas, 72 times more powerful than CO2 per molecule in the atmosphere as a GHG on a 20-year cycle. Thus even small leakages of natural gas accumulated to the atmosphere have large consequences on global warming. Multiply this by all the leaks that occur in shale gas extraction, piping, shipping, refining and end-use by industry and consumers across the US and in other countries around the world where NG is touted as the cat's meow.
Canada is getting concerned about a similar shale gas rush sweeping across the Provinces. The Winnipeg Free Press mentioned Prof. Howarth in a recent article:
3) Finally, another big industry talking point is to downplay the danger of chemicals in water used in hydraulic fracturing by likening them to seemingly innocuous "friction reducers, disinfectants and household cleaners," as Lavoie put it: "additives such as friction reducers and disinfectants that he likened to household cleaners and bleach." These sound harmless but they are not safe for drinking and are extremely harmful to infant brain development as well as human endocrine system and other organs. Read the labels sometime and explore effects on human health. You can start with the research of Dr. Theo Colborn who has investigated specific fracking chemicals in the compounds used as "friction reducers and disinfectants." It'll curl your hair.
An oil and gas expert from Cornell University, who is completing a study on the environmental impacts of shale-gas operations, says enormous amounts of energy are needed to access shale gas.
"Shale gas being promoted as environmentally clean energy and sort of a transitional fuel into the future to help with global climate change, and I don't think it's either one," environmental science professor Robert Howarth said in an interview.
He also says carbon dioxide released from shale-gas wells is relatively minimal -- it's the methane leakage that creates the biggest climate-change effect.
The Montreal Gazette reported 10-5-10 on public concerns in Quebec over gas fracking. Industry talking points were expressed slickly by CEO of Jean-Yves Lavoie, CEO of Junex Inc, a major Canadian gas driller, who delivered one of the shale gas industry's chief talking points. His remarks are typical of US industry talking points as well:"Methane is an incredibly potent greenhouse gas," Howarth said.
"Natural gas is a clean fuel that produces fewer greenhouse gas emissions than coal."
There it is, the slickly marketed lie and it was unrebutted in the Gazette article as it is often unrebutted in US media. Howarth's research findings would knock Lavoie's glib assertion out of the ball park ("See ya!" as Yankee baseball game callers say). Take a look at a brief video clip of Prof. Howarth speaking at a news conference after the EPA meeting in Binghamton NY on Sept 15 on front page of this website (scroll down). His report, not financed by the gas industry, will be the first peer-reviewed research on shale gas carbon footprint and it's set for release in about 2 or 3 months (by year end).
While we're on industry talking points delivered by CEO of a major gas driller, Mr. Lavoie also said:
"99.5 per cent of the solution injected into the ground is made up of water and sand, while the other 0.5 per cent is a combination of additives such as friction reducers and disinfectants that he likened to household cleaners and bleach."
Three things:
1) According to most experts, between 2 million and 5 million gallons of water are required for each frack, but there was no discussion in the Montreal Gazette article about these kinds of massive water withdrawals from Quebec's rivers and streams in a time of worsening climate change and more frequent droughts. The same concern would apply in the States.
2) .5% sounds like zilch in terms of chemical additives but consider this: If only 2 million gallons water are used (which might be as much as 5 millions gallons but let's assume lower figure), .5% would mean 10,000 gallons of toxic chemicals injected underground (where most of them stay, possibly to migrate through fissures created by fracking, old bore holes, etc, to contaminate drinking water aquifers over time, perhaps not in every aquifer but in some, setting up Russian Roulette for our children and grandchildren to worry about). Meanwhile the rest of the frack flowback water comes up to the surface where it might be recycled (until too concentrated in toxicity to be handled by workers); or "treated" to remove chemicals which some water experts say cannot be done to drinking water standards without astronomical cost (as of Aug 2010 PA DEP has mandated a treatment standard for produced water before it can be returned to streams/rivers whence it came; let's see if it can be done economically (UPDATE March 2011, see NYTimes 3-part series reporting that millions of gallons of toxic frack waste water, some radioactive, has been inadequately treated in and dumped into PA rivers from which drinking water is drawn); or, in a practice common among wells out West and in western PA, the "produced water"/"frack water"/waste water containing fracking chemicals is allowed to sit in gigantic impoundment pits (see photo of a pit above and also see our Rig Log on this site (scroll up) for video of citizens complaining to their city council about dreadful odors emanating from this same waste water impoundment pit) where it stinks up the neighborhood and evaporates into the air so that toxic compounds are inhaled by adults, children and animals; or the frack waste water is simply secretly dumped under cover of night somewhere in a field or stream to pollute those areas.
The problem of frack waste water reminds us another "magical" energy source which got caught in the trap of what to do with its waste: nuclear power and its nuclear waste. Ironically some compounds in waste water coming to the surface after gas fracking are radioactive.
GE Power & Water has announced a "mobile evaporator" to help drillers recycle frack water (see fuller description below). This technology, if it works, could greatly reduce the problem of waste water from fracking that comes up to the surface so toxic it cannot be treated conventionally to purity required to be returned to rivers and streams but could be recycled using the GE machine and be reused over and over, reducing need to massive fresh water withdrawals. How much is a question and will it work smoothly is another question. Another question is what to do with the ultimate recycled (toxic and sometimes radioactive) "residual"? Sometimes it's disposed of in landfills where it can leach into ground water and pollute drinking water; sometimes it's used as a de-salting product on roads, exposing children on bicycles, joggers, drivers, walker to toxic, sometimes radioactive residual frack waste. This sounds like an unfinished science project by a junior high school boy who left it on the table and went out to play. Not exactly "best management practices."
The problem of frack waste water reminds us another "magical" energy source which got caught in the trap of what to do with its waste: nuclear power and its nuclear waste. Ironically some compounds in waste water coming to the surface after gas fracking are radioactive.
GE Power & Water has announced a "mobile evaporator" to help drillers recycle frack water (see fuller description below). This technology, if it works, could greatly reduce the problem of waste water from fracking that comes up to the surface so toxic it cannot be treated conventionally to purity required to be returned to rivers and streams but could be recycled using the GE machine and be reused over and over, reducing need to massive fresh water withdrawals. How much is a question and will it work smoothly is another question. Another question is what to do with the ultimate recycled (toxic and sometimes radioactive) "residual"? Sometimes it's disposed of in landfills where it can leach into ground water and pollute drinking water; sometimes it's used as a de-salting product on roads, exposing children on bicycles, joggers, drivers, walker to toxic, sometimes radioactive residual frack waste. This sounds like an unfinished science project by a junior high school boy who left it on the table and went out to play. Not exactly "best management practices."
3) Finally, another big industry talking point is to downplay the danger of chemicals in water used in hydraulic fracturing by likening them to seemingly innocuous "friction reducers, disinfectants and household cleaners," as Lavoie put it: "additives such as friction reducers and disinfectants that he likened to household cleaners and bleach." These sound harmless but they are not safe for drinking and are extremely harmful to infant brain development as well as human endocrine system and other organs. Read the labels sometime and explore effects on human health. You can start with the research of Dr. Theo Colborn who has investigated specific fracking chemicals in the compounds used as "friction reducers and disinfectants." It'll curl your hair.
The Winnipeg Free Press mentioned Prof. Howarth in a recent article:
An oil and gas expert from Cornell University, who is completing a study on the environmental impacts of shale-gas operations, says enormous amounts of energy are needed to access shale gas.
"Shale gas being promoted as environmentally clean energy and sort of a transitional fuel into the future to help with global climate change, and I don't think it's either one," environmental science professor Robert Howarth said in an interview.
He also says carbon dioxide released from shale-gas wells is relatively minimal -- it's the methane leakage that creates the biggest climate-change effect.
"Methane is an incredibly potent greenhouse gas," Howarth said.Back in the USA, a spike in methane leaks, as we will likely see in the nationwide boom in shale gas extraction and NG use in trucks and buses, could within a few short years increase the greenhouse effect enough to help raise global temperatures. Methane is escaping into the atmosphere naturally from multiple sources like landfills and the seafloor, and massive amounts of methane recently escaped unnaturally in the prolonged BP gusher in the Gulf, "the biggest methane leak in human history, per government scientists. We don’t need to add to the greenhouse effect by leaking more methane into the atmosphere in the course of the natural gas lifespan multiplied by tens of thousands of shale gas wells being drilled nationwide.
Then there's the gas industry's virtual silence on air pollution surrounding the shale gas drilling process, again considering the full 'lifecycle." The Endocrine Disruption Exchange (including research of Dr. Theo Colborn) offers this harrowing tidbit:
In addition to the land and water contamination issues, at each stage of production and delivery, tons of toxic volatile compounds (VOCs), including benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylene, etc., and fugitive natural gas (methane), escape and mix with nitrogen oxides from the exhaust of diesel-driven, mobile and stationary equipment to produce ground-level ozone. Ozone combined with particulate matter less than 2.5 microns produces smog (haze). Gas field produced ozone has created a serious air pollution problem similar to that found in large urban areas, and can spread up to 200 miles beyond the immediate region where gas is being produced. Ozone not only causes irreversible damage to the lungs, it is equally damaging to conifers, aspen, forage, alfalfa, and other crops commonly grown in the West. Adding to this is the dust created by fleets of diesel-driven water trucks working around the clock hauling the constantly accumulating condensate water from well pads to central evaporation pits.Texas is just now (August 2010) installing air quality monitors around haze-ridden Ft. Worth where 1000 shale gas wells have been drilled.
Albert F. Appleton, former director of New York City Water and Sewer System and watershed expert said this:
Gas ‘fracking’ is not economically viable without being subsidized through the externalization of its environmental costs.Before a House hearing on hydrofracking in 2009, Appleton said:
Government is now pouring billions into green energy but this will compete with natural gas, so that if we subsidize the gas by easing the regulations we are undercutting the green energy program. And we have to be concerned about global warming.Ah, yes, global warming. It's like a pushy puzzle. Here we are, rushing forward on all cylinders with unconventional but supposedly "clean" hydrofractured natural gas while, if Professor Howarth's research is correct, natural gas with its main component of methane -- a greenhouse menace -- is not significantly cleaner than coal and dirtier than diesel in terms of its consequences on greenhouse effect, global warming and climate change.
Okay, here's another shale gas extraction PR talking point:
"It's safe!"
"Hydraulic fracturing (fracking) to blast open fissures in shale to release natural gas deep underground below water aquifers is said to be 'perfectly safe' and not a threat to drinking water, rivers, streams or to human health or the environment."
This talking point is misleading because while hydraulic fracturing itself might not often produce harm to the water supply as it is usually performed a mile or more beneath water aquifers, the drilling process on the way down using poorly constructed or maintained well casings and cementing can leak drilling mud or water laced with fracking chemicals or methane into aquifers. This was virtually admitted by Pennsylvania regulators developing new regs to improve well casings to avoid such leaks in future:
A properly cased and cemented oil and gas well is critical to protecting fresh groundwater and public safety. Many of the regulations governing well construction and water supply replacement were promulgated in July 1989 and remain largely unchanged. New well drilling and completion practices used to develop Marcellus Shale wells, as well as recent impacts to drinking water supplies by both traditional and Marcellus Shale wells, caused the Department to reevaluate the existing requirements. With the development of the oil and gas industry in this state, the potential exists for natural gas to migrate from the well bore (by means of either improperly constructed or old, deteriorated wells). This stray gas may adversely affect water supplies, as well as accumulate within or adjacent to structures such as residences and businesses. If a well is not properly constructed and operated there could be potential threat of a fire or explosion. These situations represent a threat to public safety, health and welfare. (PA DEP proposed rule-making, July 10, 2010)It remains to be seen how well gas producers comply with new regs on drill casings in PA and how well the new regs are enforced by a state already in budget crisis.
Shale Country was forthright about drilling drawbacks, only to minimize the problem. This is a classic PR trick (taking a lesson from BP's commercials): Put the bad act out there, be contrite, even use the terms "deplorable" and "illegal," then minimize it even though they say "these illegal activities should not be minimized even though it generally has been limited to the immediate vicinity" -- which minimizes:
There have been some deplorable exceptions, however, such as where an improperly cased and cemented drill bore has leaked methane into nearby ground water, or where frack fluids or produced water has been spilled or disposed of improperly. The environmental harm from these illegal activities should not be minimized even though it generally has been limited to the immediate vicinity, and the companies responsible have been disciplined by state regulators.Notice this cunningly mentions methane leaking into ground water from the drill bore but not frack water containing HF chemicals coming up to the surface leaking along the way into water aquifers from the same poorly cased drill bore. Frack water is only said to "spill" on the surface or is blown into the sky in a blowout. They slide by direct leakage through well casings into aquifers. And we don't know the answer. We have to hope that new PA regulations will lead to better constructed casings and fewer leaks of methane of frack water into ground aquifer during drilling.
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| Cecil Twp in Washington County, PA, two Range Resources wells with American flags, actively drilling behind a sound fence. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
Additionally, produced water with fracking fluid and brine has been known to spill onto the ground surface around the well bore hole, sometimes over large areas, killing vegetation. A major blowout occurred in Clearfield County PA in June 2010 which spewed frack water 75 feet into the air for 16 hours, poisoning not only the air, land and trees in the vicinity but "some of the toxic stew of gas, salt water, mud and chemicals seeped into a stream northeast of Pittsburgh" (NYT 7-9-10).
Dimock PA has become legendary as an example of ruination of drinking water in several homes by migrating natural gas thought to be the fault of nearby shale gas wells. Humongous ugly water tanks are trucked onto properties to replace their home well water.
PA DEP determined that Cabot's gas production enterprise caused methane to enter the groundwater supply in the proximity of one road in the township, according to the violation noticed obtained by the Wayne Independent. Four water wells, on or near Carter Road, were found to be corrupted with high-levels of methane, and Cabot was ordered to provide “alternate sources of water” to those residences until the problem is alleviated. Those wells are now off-line and others have been vented to prevent methane from accumulating [to avoid methane explosion]."Vented" means the methane is being allowed to escape freely into the atmosphere. This is a classic "hiding in plain sight" admission that we are bringing to the surface one of the most potent GHG's on earth willy nilly, far more potent than CO2 in greenhouse impact. The lack of concern by industry and government is shocking. This is not "remediation," this is extreme harm to the earth with a few winks and nods from gas company officials and regulators. Methane is not taken seriously -- yet -- because it's invisible and the greenhouse effect is abstract.
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| This is what a methane vent looks like, installed by a gas company to relieve pressure to avoid explosion in landowner's water well allegedly polluted during gas drilling operations. Methane, one of the most potent GHGs, is being released into the atmosphere, where most scientists agree it's a menace, worsening extreme weather. |
Abraham Lustgarten weighed in on gas drilling safety on Pro Publica in April 2010 when he interviewed Lee Fuller, vice president of government affairs for the Independent Petroleum Association of America, a gas industry lobbying group who object to study of the gas extraction "lifecycle" approach which will allow the EPA to take into account hundreds of reports of water contamination in gas drilling fields across the country. The EPA is doing its the study in response to a wave of reports of water contamination in drilling areas across the country and to broaden the scope of its 2004 study during the Bush-Cheney era which was slammed as inadequate. Watch how Fuller's explanation unfolds to reveal a classic bit of disingenuousness:
In past interviews with ProPublica, Fuller has explained that, in his view, hydraulic fracturing shouldn’t be blamed for any contamination unless the process of injecting fracturing fluids underground under pressure was "the sole" cause of contamination. If contamination seeped through cracks in a gas well’s protective casing under pressure of the fracturing process, for example, he wouldn’t attribute it to fracturing because the cracks may have existed before the fracturing process began and would be a well construction problem, not a fracturing problem.
Fuller’s definition of fracturing-related contamination helps explain the oil and gas industry’s steadfast claim that "there is not a single case in which hydraulic fracturing has been proven to have contaminated drinking water supplies." [This assertion has been a major feature of the "safe" talking point -- Ed.].
An 18-month investigation by ProPublica, however, has shown more than 1,000 cases in which various aspects of the fracturing lifecycle have affected water supplies, including spills of fracturing fluid waste, cracking of underground cement and well casings meant to enclose the fracturing process, and methane gas traveling large distances underground through faults and fractures.
So it cannot be said that "fracking" or gas drilling is "perfectly safe." It is not perfectly safe. It is risky and at times dangerous. We await the results of the EPA's major study due out at the end of 2012, two years away, with analysis of water and air quality surrounding shale gas drilling process. EPA is taking their sweet time which is why we need a moratorium on PA shale gas drilling which, ideally, should be longer to await the EPA results, like a 3 year moratorium recommended by the Philadelphia City Council 9-30-10.
So, the bottom line is this: The talking point saying that “natural gas used to generate electricity produces 60% less global warming pollution than coal” is clearly not true per Cornell's Prof. Howarth. At best, given methane leaks along the way through the lifecycle of NG, methane leaks make NG nearly as dirty as coal’s generation of CO2 for creating greenhouse gas and we don’t need yet another source as nearly as dirty as coal for creating GHG, thank you). Further to the fracturing of the Clean Skies/Shale Country talking point, Prof. Howarth believes when methane leaks are considered that NG ends up worse than diesel. Air quality (about which industry and government have been largely silent) is adversely affected by shale gas extraction, too.
Each well construction involves clear-cutting fields and trees, with wildlife habitat disturbance, to install enormous embankments for well pads. Sometimes impoundment pools are constructed in western PA although some companies are reusing or recycling water as NY state now requires.
Water treatment cannot completely filter all fracking chemicals from waste water (PA since Aug 21, 2010 has instituted a new water filter rule requiring removal of total dissolved solids (TDS) to distilled water purity levels. Reuse can be problematic as the fracking chemical build up in concentration and the water becomes unusable to gas drillers -- then what? GE has recently announced a "mobile evaporator" specifically designed to help natural gas producers recycle untreated waste water that results from the hydraulic fracturing process at the well site. According to PA Environment Digest 10-4-10, this machine "will enable on-site frac water recycling, reducing the volume of wastewater and fresh water that needs to be hauled to and from the site. GE's mobile evaporator, developed by GE's "Shale Solutions" division, will treat the severely impaired waters, such as frac flowback and produced water, making it possible to reuse the water in the industrial process, reduce the amount of fresh water consumed and reduce any subsequent environmental impact from discharge. Regions like the Marcellus Shale are unique in that they produce very high total dissolved solids (TDS) frac water, have limited deep well capacity and increasingly stringent discharge regulations. The mobile evaporator will enable natural gas producers to significantly decrease their transportation and disposal costs. Additionally, communities will benefit from less truck traffic and decreased wear and tear on local roads. The first units will be available in early 2011. The mobile evaporator is a 50-gallon per minute, horizontal, shell and tube, forced circulation, mechanical vapor recompression system. Unlike other treatment methods, thermal evaporation removes nearly all of the impurities in the water, allowing producers to easily meet the newly passed Pennsylvania discharge regulations of less than 500 TDS. The mobile evaporator is mounted on a single trailer that will allow it to reach the most remote drilling sites. Additionally, its unique design has been optimized for maximum energy efficiency."
Sounds too good to be true. 50 gallons per minute to process hundreds of thousands of gallons of waste frack water might take a while -- and is the machine noisy? But if this mobile evaporator works and does not annoy the surrounding communities with noise and all drillers use it, this might be good news.
Assuming we get the fracking waste water problem solved with the GE evaporator (from which GE will make a fortune), significant impacts remain. Access roads have to be built along with compressor stations and pipelines, creating all sorts of land disruption. Add to this hundreds of diesel truck trips back and forth to each well over narrow country roads already in various states of disrepair, especially in PA, along with commensurate diesel exhaust polluting the air in local townships and around the well sites. The GE evaporator mentioned earlier will reduce some truck traffic but there will still be many trips back and forth bringing in equipment and building materials for erecting and drilling each well plus fresh water withdrawn from rivers and streams (although these trips will be somewhat reduced by use of the GE recycling "evaporator") plus moving the natural gas to pipeline and shipping points.
Clean Water Action had this paragraph in one of their (helpful) letters:
Water treatment cannot completely filter all fracking chemicals from waste water (PA since Aug 21, 2010 has instituted a new water filter rule requiring removal of total dissolved solids (TDS) to distilled water purity levels. Reuse can be problematic as the fracking chemical build up in concentration and the water becomes unusable to gas drillers -- then what? GE has recently announced a "mobile evaporator" specifically designed to help natural gas producers recycle untreated waste water that results from the hydraulic fracturing process at the well site. According to PA Environment Digest 10-4-10, this machine "will enable on-site frac water recycling, reducing the volume of wastewater and fresh water that needs to be hauled to and from the site. GE's mobile evaporator, developed by GE's "Shale Solutions" division, will treat the severely impaired waters, such as frac flowback and produced water, making it possible to reuse the water in the industrial process, reduce the amount of fresh water consumed and reduce any subsequent environmental impact from discharge. Regions like the Marcellus Shale are unique in that they produce very high total dissolved solids (TDS) frac water, have limited deep well capacity and increasingly stringent discharge regulations. The mobile evaporator will enable natural gas producers to significantly decrease their transportation and disposal costs. Additionally, communities will benefit from less truck traffic and decreased wear and tear on local roads. The first units will be available in early 2011. The mobile evaporator is a 50-gallon per minute, horizontal, shell and tube, forced circulation, mechanical vapor recompression system. Unlike other treatment methods, thermal evaporation removes nearly all of the impurities in the water, allowing producers to easily meet the newly passed Pennsylvania discharge regulations of less than 500 TDS. The mobile evaporator is mounted on a single trailer that will allow it to reach the most remote drilling sites. Additionally, its unique design has been optimized for maximum energy efficiency."
Sounds too good to be true. 50 gallons per minute to process hundreds of thousands of gallons of waste frack water might take a while -- and is the machine noisy? But if this mobile evaporator works and does not annoy the surrounding communities with noise and all drillers use it, this might be good news.
Assuming we get the fracking waste water problem solved with the GE evaporator (from which GE will make a fortune), significant impacts remain. Access roads have to be built along with compressor stations and pipelines, creating all sorts of land disruption. Add to this hundreds of diesel truck trips back and forth to each well over narrow country roads already in various states of disrepair, especially in PA, along with commensurate diesel exhaust polluting the air in local townships and around the well sites. The GE evaporator mentioned earlier will reduce some truck traffic but there will still be many trips back and forth bringing in equipment and building materials for erecting and drilling each well plus fresh water withdrawn from rivers and streams (although these trips will be somewhat reduced by use of the GE recycling "evaporator") plus moving the natural gas to pipeline and shipping points.
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| Shale gas rig at sunset near Hickory PA. Photo courtesy of www.marcellus-shale.us |
The Scientific American article recommended by Dr. Howarth, "A Path to Sustainable Energy by 2030" offers a comprehensive discussion of the way forward. Here are the highlights:Pennsylvania is no stranger to environmental destruction at the hands of a booming industry. Our landscapes are still scarred from our coal and steel legacies. We cannot again sacrifice the long-term health and well being of our Commonwealth for short-term gain.
* Supplies of wind and solar energy on accessible land dwarf the energy consumed by people around the globe.
* The authors’ plan calls for 3.8 million large wind turbines, 90,000 solar plants, and numerous geothermal, tidal and rooftop photovoltaic installations worldwide.
* The cost of generating and transmitting power would be less than the projected cost per kilowatt-hour for fossil-fuel and nuclear power.
* Shortages of a few specialty materials, along with lack of political will, loom as the greatest obstacles.
"Lack of political will" is a gulper. Snap out of it!
Read Anne Willard editorial Dec 14, 2012 on what an energy transition "bridge" would look like if elected leaders and gas industry were sincerely using that term to move to renewables and not merely an excuse to stay in carbon energy and avoid moving to renewable for as long as humanly possible.
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