Pennsylvania Families Sue Southwestern Energy on Shale Drilling
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-15/pennsylvania-families-sue-southwestern-energy-on-alleged-shale-pollution.html
Pennsylvania Families Sue Southwestern Energy on Shale Drilling
Thirteen families in northeastern Pennsylvania filed a lawsuit against Southwestern Energy Co. alleging that the company’s drilling for natural gas has contaminated drinking water.
Southwestern spoiled water wells by hydraulic fracturing, a process that uses blasts of water and chemicals to free natural gas from shale rock, according to the complaint filed yesterday in the civil division of the Court of Common Pleas of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. The company used fracturing in October 2008 on a gas well in Lenox Township, Pennsylvania, according to Mark Boling, Southwestern’s general counsel.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is studying the drilling technique, known as fracking, to determine its effect on underground water supplies. Gas from shale may produce 50 percent of the U.S. gas supply by 2035, up from 20 percent today, according to IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates.
“We actually had the chemicals associated with fracking fluids leaking into wells,” Peter Cambs, an attorney representing the families, said in an interview. “Something was going on related to the fracking process.”
Southwestern tested water wells in the area, about 27 miles (43 kilometers) north of Scranton, and found no contamination that could be linked to its drilling, Boling said.
“From our testing, we did not find anything that would lead one to believe that it’s from our drilling operations,” Boling said in an interview. “Part of our investigation is going to be trying to find out what prior uses were on the property to see if there was some industrial activity.”
Southwestern, based in Houston, is the largest natural-gas producer in the Fayetteville Shale formation in Arkansas.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jim Efstathiou Jr. in Binghamton, New York at 1647 or jefstathiou@bloomberg.net.
2010.09.15 – Board provides info on rare blood cancer
http://standardspeaker.com/news/board-provides-info-on-rare-blood-cancer-1.1012538
Published: September 15, 2010
2010.09.15 – Board provides info on rare blood cancer
SPECIAL TO THE STANDARD-SPEAKER Joseph Murphy, an advisor to the Tri-County Polycythemia Vera Community Advisory Committee, talks about a public display board at Tamaqua Borough Hall was developed by the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry to provide accurate and easy-to-understand information about polycythemia vera.
By TOM RAGAN
The Tri-County Polycythemia Vera Community Advisory Committee is making an effort to educate the public about this rare but treatable form of blood cancer found at elevated levels in Luzerne, Schuylkill and Carbon counties.
The new health outreach board was recently unveiled at a news conference held in Tamaqua, Mayor Christian Morrison said.
“We all believe that we lost people in our area that did not even know they had polycythemia vera,” Morrison said.
A public display board at Tamaqua Borough Hall was developed by the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry at the request of the committee to provide accurate and easy-to-understand information about polycythemia vera, Morrison said.
The display board will be moved to other locations in the future, Morrison said.
The Tri-County Polycythemia Vera Community Advisory Committee will host a public meeting on Sept. 22 at 7 p.m. at the Tamaqua High School Auditorium, 500 Penn St., Tamaqua.
Morrison said area residents will be able to meet with research teams conducting studies to learn more about the many cases of polycythemia vera in the area and their possible causes.
“Data will be available to the public from the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Geisinger and researchers from Drexel University, the University of Pittsburgh, and Mount Sinai Hospital in New York,” Morrison said.
The Tamaqua mayor said they will have handbills available for the public at the Sept. 22 meeting.
The studies were made available through two grants totaling $8 million secured by U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, Morrison said.
The committee passed a resolution honoring Specter at its June 30 meeting.
“Each of the agencies will have an overview on the studies taking place,” Morrison said.
He said a lot of the data will also point to a five-year review being conducted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency at the McAdoo Associates Superfund site in Kline Township and McAdoo.
The site once was linked to abnormally high cases of cancer but EPA officials say that there is no evidence of site-related cancers.
tragan@standardspeaker.com
Celebrate the Great Outdoors
Dear Members and Friends,
Carbon County, PA is celebrating the great outdoors with a month-long schedule of events, many of them free of charge and some at Lehigh Gap Nature Center. To see the entire schedule, visit the Carbon County Chamber web site at:
http://www.carboncountychamber.org/
and click on the logo on the lower left for Celebrate the Great Outdoors.
To highlight the events at LGNC, I list them below. Hope you can get out and enjoy some of these events.
Dan
Dan Kunkle
Lehigh Gap Nature Center
P.O. Box 198
Slatington, PA 18080
ph/fax 610-760-8889
http://lgnc.org
###
Title: Hawk Watching at Bake Oven Knob
Location: Bake Oven Knob (see http://lgnc.org/maps-directions#BOK for directions)
Description: Daily observation of raptor migration along the Kittatinny Ridge
Leader: LGNC interns and volunteers
Come any time throughout the day
When: Daily September 1-30 from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
Title: Birding at Lehigh Gap Nature Center – FREE
Location: Lehigh Gap Nature Center
Description: Birding for warblers and other fall migrants. Meet at the Osprey
House.
When: Saturday, September 18, 2010, 7:00 AM
Title: Butterfly Tagging at Lehigh Gap Nature Center – FREE
Location: Lehigh Gap Nature Center
Description: Monarch butterfly migration workshop. Come learn and help catch
and tag migrating Monarchs. Programs for children through adults. Meet at the Osprey House.
When: Saturday, September 18, 2010, 10:00 AM to Noon
Title: HawkFest at LGNC – FREE
Location: Lehigh Gap Nature Center
Description: Our annual celebration of hawk migration and Appalachian Mountain
ecology. Learn about the annual fall spectacle of hawks and other raptors
migrating along the Kittatinny Ridge and how to identify raptors. Displays include
live raptors and reptiles and amphibians. Meet at BAKE OVEN KNOB parking lot.
When: Sunday, September 19, 2010, 1:00 PM – 4:00 PM
Title: Loop Hike on D&L Trail and LGNC Trails
Location: Meeting Place: Osprey House at LGNC. See www.lgnc.org for
directions.
Description: Hike Distance: 6 miles with some moderate uphill walking. Start at
Osprey House heading northwest on the D&L Trail. Hike along the D&L Trail to
Three Ponds Trail. Follow Three Ponds to LNE and Chestnut Oak Trail, back
Prairie Grass Trail and along LNE back to Osprey House.
Meeting Place: Osprey House at LGNC. See www.lgnc.org for directions.
Leader: Jim Gabovitz 610-262-3578 gabby@enter.net
When: Saturday, September 25, 2010, 10:00 AM
Survey measures residents’ attitudes about Marcellus exploration
http://live.psu.edu/story/48364/nw69
Survey measures residents’ attitudes about Marcellus exploration
Friday, September 10, 2010
While energy companies continue to search beneath Pennsylvania for natural gas, social scientists are looking for ways to tap into the attitudes of residents about the gas-exploration boom in the region.
Residents in 21 Pennsylvania counties and eight New York counties — a region some refer to as “the Marcellus Fairway” — recently completed a survey looking at their level of satisfaction with their home communities, their knowledge about Marcellus Shale drilling and their trust in the process. The results suggest that, overall, the public-opinion jury is still out, according to Kathy Brasier, assistant professor of rural sociology in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences.
Brasier will be the featured speaker during a free, Web-based seminar titled, “Natural Gas Experiences of Marcellus Residents: Preliminary Results from the Community Satisfaction Survey,” which will air at 1 p.m. on Sept. 16. Sponsored by Penn State Cooperative Extension, the “webinar” will provide an overview of the recent survey of residents in counties where shale-gas exploration has begun.
Information about how to register for the webinar is available at http://extension.psu.edu/naturalgas/webinars. Online participants will have the opportunity to ask the speaker questions during the session.
“The main research objective was to establish baseline data so that, as we repeat the survey over the development of the Marcellus, we can track changes in people’s experiences and thoughts about the shale,” said Brasier. She noted that the main educational objective was to get a better sense of what people living in the region think about Marcellus, to create educational programming that takes into account local views — whether those are commonly held ideas or points of conflict.
Brasier said, based on the responses of nearly 2,000 participants, the survey revealed that significant proportions of people had yet to form opinions or report knowledge about Marcellus development. However, she said that those who have formed opinions were pretty strong in their feelings, responding in the extreme ends of the attitude items.
When asked about overall support for natural-gas extraction in the Marcellus, about 45 percent support it; 33 percent neither support nor oppose it, and 21 percent oppose Marcellus exploration. She said that there was more opposition among New York respondents, with nearly 31 percent opposing Marcellus gas extraction. In contrast, 19 percent of Pennsylvania respondents oppose drilling in the Marcellus.
Brasier conjectured that one possible reason for greater opposition in New York — where Marcellus drilling has not been approved — was the idea that stopping shale-gas extraction is still on the table. “There is still talk that they may be extending the moratorium, and that might be a little bit greater motivation for those who oppose it,” she said. “That’s not going to happen in Pennsylvania. Here, it’s coming, and if people are in the ‘opposed’ camp, it’s more about how to shape it to have the least damage.”
Accordingly, the main issues people felt they knew something about were environmental and water impacts. Environmental issues were also the ones people thought would “get worse,” according to the survey. The only area that people thought would get better was the availability of good jobs, Brasier said.
She said that a relatively small number of respondents (10 percent) had signed a lease for gas rights. Of these, about half are satisfied with the terms of the lease. About half had received lease or royalty payments. A majority of those who had received payments said they were satisfied.
In addition to questions about the respondents’ satisfaction with and attachment to their community, and knowledge of Marcellus Shale activities and impacts, participants also were asked their attitudes about development of the Marcellus and their trust in organizations that are active in Marcellus Shale issues. Brasier said that trust in the natural-gas industry, state agencies and state governments has a great deal to do with attitudes toward Marcellus exploration.
Attitudes might also vary depending on whether respondents had bad previous experiences with other extractive sectors, such as coal or shallow gas, or had experienced other social or environmental problems as a result of that activity.
Brasier said that future work will compare responses on the community satisfaction variables across time. She said she also wants to get a better sense of residents’ feelings about the workers, including those who might have moved recently to the area because of gas drilling. Future surveys also are likely to explore what people do for recreation and how these activities might be affected by drilling.
The “Natural Gas Experiences of Marcellus Residents” webinar is part of an ongoing series of workshops addressing issues related to the state’s Marcellus Shale gas boom. Previous webinars, which covered topics such as water use and quality, zoning, gas-leasing considerations for landowners and implications for local communities, can be viewed at http://extension.psu.edu/naturalgas/webinars online.
For more information, contact John Turack, extension educator in Westmoreland County, at 724-937-1402 or by e-mail at jdt15@psu.edu.
Contact John Dickison jmd16@psu.edu
EPA wants chemical info from 9 service providers
http://www.timesleader.com/news/EPA-wants-chemical-info-from-9-service-providers.html
September 10, 2010
EPA wants chemical info from 9 service providers
MATT HUGHES mhughes@timesleader.com
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Thursday it has requested information about chemicals used in the hydraulic fracturing process from nine leading service providers involved in operations in the Marcellus Shale natural gas region.
The EPA said it is preparing a study of whether a link exists between hydraulic fracturing, also known as “fracking,” and a health hazard from contaminated drinking water.
“This scientifically rigorous study will help us understand the potential impacts of hydraulic fracturing on drinking water – a concern that has been raised by Congress and the American people,” EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said in a statement Thursday.
The federal agency has requested information about the contents of hydraulic fracturing fluids used by BJ Services, Complete Production Services, Halliburton, Key Energy Services, Patterson-UTI, RPC Inc., Schlumberger, Superior Well Services and Weatherford, all of which are involved in fracking the Marcellus Shale.
The announcement comes as Congress debates two bills, introduced in June 2009, and collectively dubbed the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals, or FRAC Act, which would amend the Safe Drinking Water Act to require drillers to disclose the contents of hydraulic fracturing fluids and which would subject the hydraulic fracturing process to federal regulation.
The study also follows a November 2009 request by Congress that the EPA undertake a new study of the process. The EPA said it plans to announce initial results of the study in late 2012.
Hydraulic fracturing is a process in which water, sand and additives are pumped into underground geological formations to create fractures, and, in the case of shale gas drilling, unlock natural gas deposits.
A spokesman for the Marcellus Shale Coalition, a group advocating Marcellus Shale gas extraction, said his group is eager to assist the EPA in any way it can with its study, as he believes it will verify the safety of the fracking process.
Coalition spokesman Travis Windle said the fracking process has a more than 60-year record of safe operations and a 2004 EPA study of hydraulic fracturing in much shallower coal bed methane reservoirs found no link between fracking and aquifer contamination.
“We’re confident that a study, which is grounded in facts, and is straightforward and methodical, is going to prove what the EPA said in the past,” Windle said “It’s going to underscore the long and clear record that fracturing does not pose any threat to groundwater contamination.”
However, the coalition strongly opposes the EPA regulation that Congress is considering, Windle said, stating federal regulation “would devastate job production.”
“The 44,000 jobs that our industry has created in Pennsylvania alone in the last four years would be dramatically undercut if this misguided legislation was enacted,” Windle said, explaining that under the proposed FRAC Act legislation, drillers would be required to apply for EPA permits before beginning hydraulic fracturing, which would slow the drilling.
Windle said chemicals used in fracking fluid in Pennsylvania are publicly available information and the industry is monitored by the state Department of Environmental Protection.
A spokesman for gas-extraction company Cabot Oil and Gas, which is active in Susquehanna County, said the company is not involved in the EPA study, but welcomes the opportunity “to partner with the EPA to show them that it’s a safe technology.”
Cabot is involved in a lawsuit brought in 2009 by Dimock residents, who claim Cabot’s drilling operations polluted their drinking water.
Cabot spokesman George Stark would not comment on the subject of an active lawsuit, but said generally of Dimock that “the Department of Environmental Protection has stated that the situation there is not the result of hydraulic fracturing.”
“In the operations that Cabot has been involved with, we have not seen that there has been a threat to drinking water through the hydraulic fracturing process,” Stark said.
DEP Investigating Source of Stray Methane Gas in Bradford County
DEP Investigating Source of Stray Methane Gas in Bradford County
DEP to Require Complete Remediation
HARRISBURG — The Department of Environmental Protection is continuing to investigate the source of stray methane gas detected in the Susquehanna River and at six private water wells in Wilmont Township, Bradford County, late last week.
“Chesapeake Energy has been working at the direction of DEP to determine the source or sources of the stray gas,” said Hanger. “Gas migration is a serious, potentially dangerous problem. Chesapeake must stop the gas from migrating.”
Chesapeake has six Marcellus Shale gas wells located on the Welles well pads one three and four, located two to three miles northwest of the Susquehanna River. These wells are believed to be the source of stray gas that was detected on Aug. 4 at a residence located on Paradise Road in Terry Township. DEP issued a notice of violation to Chesapeake and required it to provide and implement a plan to remediate. Progress has been made, but, to date, this violation has not yet been fully resolved.
While neither DEP nor Chesapeake have been able to conclusively show that the Welles wells are the source, DEP believes that they are the most likely source.
The wells were drilled between Dec. 2009 and March of this year; however the wells have not been fractured or “fracked” and are not producing Marcellus gas. For that reason, DEP believes that any stray gas migrating from these wells is not from the Marcellus Shale formation, but from a more shallow rock formation.
Chesapeake has screened 26 residences within a one-half mile radius of the river and found six water wells to have elevated levels of methane. Chesapeake monitored each of the houses served by an impacted water well and found no indication of methane gas in the homes.
On Sept. 3, high levels of methane were detected in the crawl space under a seasonal residence. Emergency responders were contacted to ventilate below the home and gas and electric utilities were shut off to eliminate any potential for ignition.
Chesapeake has equipped water wells with high levels of methane with ventilation systems and installed five methane monitors in the homes associated with the im-pacted wells. Additionally, Chesapeake has provided potable water to the effected residents.
No residents have been evacuated from their homes.
DEP first received information about water bubbles in the Susquehanna River late on Sept. 2, with additional reports received the next morning of bubbling in two private drinking water wells nearby. In response, DEP sent two teams of inspectors to investigate the source of stray methane gas on Sept. 3.
One team of DEP inspectors went to the Susquehanna River near to Sugar Run where bubbling had been reported. DEP collected samples of the gas for isotopic analysis which is used to identify the source. Analysis of the lab results will be complete within 2 weeks.
Biogenic methane gas is formed at shallow depths from the natural organic decomposition of waste, such as one would find in swamp gas. Thermogenic methane gas is produced in deeper geologic formations and is the gas typically developed for economic purposes.
Both DEP and Chesapeake have taken gas samples from the water well heads and the natural gas wells. The results will help to determine if the source of the stray gas detected at the river and in the water wells is the Welles wells.
Anyone who notices unusual bubbling in surface or well water should notify DEP immediately by calling 570-327-3636.
####
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/newsroom/14287?id=14034&typeid=1
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA
Dept. of Environmental Protection
Commonwealth News Bureau
Room 308, Main Capitol Building
Harrisburg PA., 17120
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
09/7/2010
CONTACT:
Helen Humphreys, Department of Environmental Protection
717-787-1323
Penn State researchers ‘whet’ teen students’ interest in water cycle
http://live.psu.edu/story/47937/nw69
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Penn State researchers ‘whet’ teen students’ interest in water cycle
Photo by Margaret Hopkins In Pun, a rising ninth grader at State College Area High School, gets help from George Holmes, Penn State graduate student in civil engineering, on how to read an electronic water-level sensor. For more photos from the Stone Valley streambed ‘lab,’ click on the image above.
University Park. — A dry streambed in a small wooded valley near Penn State’s Stone Valley Recreation Area became a “living” laboratory Wednesday (Aug. 18) for a group of State College Area High School students getting an early taste of earth science.
Using soil moisture probes and water-level sensors, the teens sampled 16 sites to determine the depth of the water table and the moisture content along a streambed that was so dry in parts that it was almost dusty. The laboratory was the 20-acre Shale Hills watershed in the Penn State Stone Valley Experimental Forest in Huntingdon County.
Instructing the students was Chris Duffy, Penn State professor of civil engineering, who is the lead researcher in the NSF-sponsored Susquehanna Shale Hills Critical Zone Observatory (CZO). Critical Zone science explores the complex physical chemical and biological processes that shape and transform the life-sustaining Critical Zone stretching from the top of vegetation to the bottom of groundwater.
Researchers in three Penn State colleges, Engineering, Earth and Mineral Sciences and Agricultural Sciences, are involved in examining water flow patterns and rates as it moves through the subsurface of the Shale Hills watershed.
A new initiative for the State College Area School District, the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) academy is emphasizing hands-on activities with students building instruments, conducting experiments and analyzing data.
“When kids see and do hand-on things, they remember it far better than being told what it is and how it works,” said Wendy Watts, who teaches physics in the school district and who also took a turn measuring soil moisture with the students.
The students’ measurements confirmed their hypotheses: Soil on the banks of the stream was drier than the soil in the streambed, and soils are drier closer to stream headwaters.
“Doing experiments and seeing how it works in person helps me learn it better,” said 14-year old In Pun, one of the 10 students in the State College Area School District’s week long STEM Summer Academy. “I’m really understanding how the water cycle works and how everything affects it.”
Amer Sible, 14, said, “This helps me make connections between the everyday things you see and the science behind them.”
Dave Klindienst, the district STEM coordinator, said the district is looking to build more collaborations with Penn State, a goal that also fits well with Duffy.
“If we want to move Critical Zone Observatories forward as a national network, we need education at the K-12 level in the mix,” Duffy said. “Today was an opportunity for students to learn about ecology, geology and hydrology with mentors.”
Wading through water-test results subject of webinar
http://live.psu.edu/story/48230/nw69
Friday, September 3, 2010
Wading through water-test results subject of webinar
Well owners may wish to have drinking water tested before and after nearby gas wells are drilled.
When it comes to water-test results, one of the murkiest problems facing homeowners is how to interpret the results, according to an expert in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences. And with the flood of Marcellus shale gas-drilling activity in Pennsylvania, there has been a steadily rising tide of information about water availability, water quality, water-testing procedures and what those tests indicate.
“We’re finding that in a lot of these counties, there is a lot of water testing being done by gas companies or by households — before and after drilling — and these water test reports can be very hard to understand,” said Bryan Swistock, a water resources extension specialist in the college’s School of Forest Resources. “For some, it’s like trying to decipher foreign language.”
To help owners of private water supplies navigate the water-testing maze, Swistock will conduct a free Web-based seminar titled, “How to Interpret Pre- and Post-Gas Drilling Water Test Reports.” Part of a series of online water-related workshops produced by Penn State Cooperative Extension, the webinar will air at noon and again at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 15.
Participants must pre-register for the webinars, but only one registration is required for the entire series. To register, visit http://extension.psu.edu/water/webinar-series. Once participants have pre-registered, they may visit the webinar site (https://breeze.psu.edu/water1) on the day of the presentation to view the live presentation.
Water-quality experts, gas-company officials and attorneys all agree that if gas-drilling activity is scheduled to take place nearby, homeowners should get pre-drill water testing done, Swistock said. Because gas companies have a presumed responsibility for water quality within 1,000 feet of a gas well, they frequently provide free water testing to homeowners within that radius. Some gas companies may pay to test private water systems even beyond 1,000 feet from a gas well, he added.
Homeowners who live outside that range — or ones who don’t trust free testing — may opt to pay for their own testing. For these consumers, Swistock advises hiring a state-accredited lab to come out to the home. The water sample then becomes a “legally valid” sample, the chain of custody of which is assured, should a case go to court, he said.
Swistock explained that water testing for all possible pollutants associated with gas-well drilling can by very expensive. Homeowners should discuss the costs of the testing with the laboratory or consultant to select a testing package that addresses their concerns while still being affordable.
Some homeowners are distressed to discover pre-existing problems that have nothing to do with gas exploration. It is common to uncover problems such as bacteria, traces of nitrate, or lead, which sometimes can come from the home’s own plumbing system. “Some problems don’t have symptoms, so if the well was never tested previously, and people didn’t experience any symptoms, they’ll think the test result was doctored,” Swistock said.
He noted that more than 1 million Pennsylvania homes and farms have drilled water wells, and about 45 percent of them have never been tested. He said bacteria occurs in about one-third of water wells in the state and is likely to go undetected unless someone had reason to investigate.
Changes in other water conditions may prompt more immediate investigation. Nearby construction or drilling may create changes in water’s appearance, taste or availability. The sudden onset of spurting faucets, foaming or cloudy water, metallic or salty tastes, previously undetected odors, or reduced flow volume may each indicate manmade problems caused by localized disturbances.
In addition to water sources, information also should be carefully evaluated. With the recent deluge of sources disseminating information related to protecting water supplies near gas drilling, Swistock suggests that homeowners with private water systems in the Marcellus region be vigilant and carefully weigh comments and recommendations they receive. He recommends seeking out credible sources of information, trustworthy third-party testing services and state-accredited water labs to conduct the testing.
“It’s our mission to provide unbiased information grounded in research to help people manage and protect the water resources of Pennsylvania,” Swistock said. “None of my current or past research funding has come from the Marcellus gas industry. My only goal is to provide facts that will help homeowners and others make the best decision possible.”
The webinar also will provide viewers with links to useful websites, including a description of various water tests, a list of state-accredited labs and an online Drinking Water Interpretation Tool to help homeowners interpret complex water test reports.
This presentation is part of an overall series targeting the most common water questions and concerns people have about water resources on their own property, whether those are water wells, septic systems or ponds. Other topics in the series include managing septic systems, ponds and lakes, drilling wells and safe drinking water. Recordings of previous webinars can be found at http://extension.psu.edu/water/webinar-series.