NO

Fracking Industry Needs to Follow Laws, Too The shale gas industry has made a habit of overstating fracking's benefits and understating its risks. It likes to point only to economic benefits, which are mostly isolated and temporary, while ignoring a rising number of reports of broken industry promises, harm to local communities, and air pollution and water contamination. Just recently, in Pavillion, Wyo., the Environmental Protection Agency found fracking chemicals in well water. We cannot afford to ignore these reports. If we don't take steps to safeguard our water resources, air quality, and public health, the harm we would suffer would far outweigh the purported economic benefits associated with fracking. That's why I authored a legislative provision that directed the EPA to undertake the first-ever comprehensive study of fracturing. Residents who live near drilling sites have reported severe illness, foul-smelling, dirty-looking water, livestock deaths, fish kills, and other environmental problems. This is the first attempt at an independent, unbiased scientific review of fracking, and it's long overdue. I also introduced the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act. This legislation simply requires the fracking industry to follow the same rules that every other industry must follow. It would eliminate the special exemption from the Safe Drinking Water Act pushed through Congress by the Bush administration and require the public disclosure of chemicals used in the fracking process. It's the minimum of what should be done. If fracking is as safe as the industry claims, then gas companies have nothing to fear from federal oversight. The industry's alarmed reaction only raises more questions. Even though this federal law would be implemented by states and account for differences in geologic formations, the industry has rejected it. Why? Because the industry would prefer to rely on the very state regulators to whom they pay millions of dollars annually in permitting fees. We're already seeing what that relationship gets us. Pennsylvania levied fines on only 4 percent of drillers who violated the law. After one company in Pennsylvania contaminated drinking water for 16 homes, the fine was less than what the company earns in three hours. Amazingly, it was the largest fine ever levied. We all know that the air we breathe and the water we drink don't respect state boundaries. That's why Congress passed laws like the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Safe Drinking Water Act. The fracking industry should have to abide by those public health laws, just like everyone else.

NO

Fracking Is Destroying Our Groundwater Fracking frees up gas in deep geologic formations such as the Marcellus and Utica shales that have spawned the current drilling frenzy. Also held there are ancient marine waters and naturally occurring toxic substances that are not a problem when segregated by a mile or more from the earth's surface and fresh groundwater zones. Fracking disturbs, distributes, and carries upward with the fracked gas "produced waters" containing radioactive materials, heavy metals, hydrocarbons such as BTEX (benzene, toluene, ethyl benzene, and toluene), bromide, highly concentrated salts, and many other organic and inorganic compounds that, when exposed to our environment, are dangerous health hazards--many are known carcinogens and toxic to biological life. The chemicals added to the injected frack fluid obviously compound the problem, but even if companies were to switch to "green," non-toxic fracking fluids, drilling and fracking in these deep formations will always deliver potentially deadly chemical hazards, even in a perfectly regulated world. A recognized problem this poses is that each fracked well produces millions of gallons of highly contaminated wastewater, yet there are no currently operating facilities that remove all of these pollutants. Less understood is that fracking is destroying our groundwater, and there is no way to prevent it. Drilled wells provide pathways for these contaminants to rise under pressure and mix with freshwater aquifers, causing these deep geology pollutants to mingle with shallow groundwater. The cement and steel casings used and the plugging methods for post-production gas wells do not isolate methane, other dangerous gases, and pressure-driven contaminated fluids from the aquifer. The zonal isolation will be breached either instantly due to poor construction; in a period of years, due to harsh downhole conditions eating away the cement and steel; or, if best available technology is employed, within 80 to 100 years--it is not a question of "if," it is a question of "when." The industry is well aware of this, as are regulators. Apparently, they have decided to sacrifice our groundwater. Our drinking water and the springs that provide the base flow of our streams and rivers originate from these aquifers. Less than 1 percent of the earth's water is potable and, due to other (some related) influences, it is vanishing still. Once our groundwater is contaminated, it is ruined, not only for us but for uncounted future generations. What calculated benefit could possibly make this a good idea?

NO

Fracking Threatens Public Safety and Health Let's be very clear about the situation that we're facing in New York: Hydraulic fracturing will be a roll of the dice. We've witnessed the litany of leaks, spills, and contaminations associated with hydraulic fracturing in other states. If we're not diligent and precise in the way that we regulate fracking here in New York, we risk potentially catastrophic repeats of past incidents inside of our own borders. The recent developments in Pennsylvania are instructive. In Bradford County, just south of the New York state border, a blowout earlier this year at a Chesapeake drilling site caused toxic brine water and hydraulic fracturing fluids to spew into nearby Towanda Creek for over 13 hours. This is just one of the incidents that prompted Pennsylvania regulators to levy 284 violations and 58 enforcement actions against Chesapeake Energy in recent years. In the small town of Dimock, residents cannot consume their own drinking water and have been receiving water deliveries from Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. since 2009 (Cabot still claims no responsibility for the contamination). Beyond environmental considerations, it is troubling that the rosy economic projections related to drilling made by government agencies and outside experts have often not been as advertised. Here in New York, the advocacy group Food and Water Watch just released a report that the 62,620 direct and indirect jobs expected in the state may likely come in at one tenth of what's been projected. The report also examined private-sector job figures in five Pennsylvania counties for the years 2007 to 2010, and found overall declines in employment among residents of those counties, despite the existence of many active wells. It's indisputable that hydraulic fracturing will create some number of new jobs--however, I believe we should be wary of some of the optimistic estimates that are out there. Finally, I am deeply concerned that staffing levels at the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation may not be adequate to sufficiently regulate hydraulic fracturing if the state allows this type of drilling to occur. One of the bitter lessons learned from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in April 2010 was that an impotent government regulatory body is a recipe for disaster. We cannot allow inadequate DEC staffing levels to degrade an extremely capable agency into a homegrown version of the Minerals Management Service. New York needs to not only keep the DEC off of the chopping block when it comes to jobs, it must bolster its ranks in order to preserve public safety and health.

NO

Fracking Is Not a Solution Too many of America's government officials, nonprofit organizations, and private citizens are caught up in a futile effort to "manage" fracking, when we need to ban the practice altogether (as is already happening in parts of our nation and around the world). "Fracking," and the entire process of shale gas extraction, is not the solution to our energy challenges, as the oil and gas industry portrays it to us; instead, it is scraping the bottom of the geological barrel, bringing unacceptable health, climate, and environmental consequences while delaying and distracting us from developing energy policies to ensure our children's future. Marcellus Shale Protest advocates a total ban on shale gas extraction, instead of "regulation", because: 1. Our scientific understanding is inadequate for responsible risk management. The environmental and health consequences of shale gas drilling are hard to measure, but pervasive and potentially irreversible. Proposed regulations address only those substances for which we already have criteria. The chemical mixture in "fracking fluid" is only one of many sources of environmental contamination; abandoned capped wells, after economic production ends, will be hazards for millennia to come--far longer than all human experience with concrete and steel. 2. The industry's campaign of disinformation has hijacked public dialog. Citizens can't realistically appraise "risk-benefit" decisions when they are shouted-down by phony claims of imagined economic security and "energy independence," and while their actual experience (deteriorating health, destruction of property values, diversion of water and crop-land) is mocked and trivialized, and court cases remain sealed. 3. Democratic institutions are being corrupted by industry money and power. Elected officials, university researchers and educators, consultants, and media outlets can't be relied upon to advocate for the public interest when they depend upon donations and revenues from industry. 4. A false sense of urgency has been created. There is no near-term domestic demand for shale gas (which, ultimately, will be exported for higher margins to Asia). In truth, energy companies desperately need to prop up their accounting house-of-cards, of which "proven reserves" and "acreage held-by-production" are the foundation.

The gas industry promises to "do it right," when there is no such thing; and, in our current political climate, there is no chance of holding this industry accountable. Marcellus Shale Protest views the media fixation upon regulations and taxation as missing the point, and we continue to insist on a total ban as the only responsible public policy.

NO

Learn the Hard Lessons of Coal Pollution Drilling for oil and gas is not new. Fracking is not necessarily new. What's new? The massive and unprecedented scale, that's what. To exploit the deep, natural gas-rich shale deposits, like the Utica and Marcellus in Appalachia, operators must drill and frack like never before. This scale of drilling requires more of everything: more acreage (5 acres cleared per well pad); more chemicals to stimulate production; more fresh water (estimated 5 million gallons per fracking cycle); and more truck traffic (estimated 13,000 diesel truck trips per site). With such colossal-scale drilling, it is imperative that we take a collective breath and make certain that regulations truly protect our gas-field communities. Unfortunately, that is not the current state of the law (or the politics). Prime example: The oil and gas industry continues to receive special treatment in the form of exemptions from federal water, air, drinking water, and hazardous waste laws. Yet, we need to focus on the risks, not just federal exemptions. As fracking has increased nationally, the number of documented spills, blowouts, leaks, and explosions from poor well construction is shocking. The environmental and human consequences have been very serious (and well documented) in a number of states, including Pennsylvania, Texas, Wyoming, and Colorado. Wastewater from the shale deposits contains radioactive material and heavy metals (not to mention the witch's brew of frack fluid). Waste disposal, thus, is a risky proposition. Risks can be temporarily mitigated through reusing the frack water, but current regulations don't require it. In fact, there have been permits granted allowing disposal through local treatment facilities and discharged into recreational and drinking water sources. However, it's not only water but also air regulations that need to catch up with the drilling. Drilling and production emit tons of nasty stuff like hydrogen sulfide, VOCs, and methane (a greenhouse gas more climate-impacting than CO2). But, U.S. EPA is only now starting the process of regulating air pollutants from drilling--and methane is not yet part of the discussion. My governor, Ohio's John Kasich, claims that fracking is a "godsend" for our economy. He may be correct. Yet, taking time to get human health protections right may make us all richer in the long run. Or, at least, save us from future buyers' remorse. Just take a lesson from coal. Around the country, dirty coal plants are closing or adding expensive equipment to mitigate decades of pollution. What if we had the foresight 50 years ago to ensure that our coal plants were regulated properly? Imagine how many premature deaths could have been avoided. We have that opportunity now with fracking--if we only seize it.