No Freedom in this Independence Day Parade

The 4th of July is all about Freedom: the huge tea party in Boston Harbor that slaked nobody's thirst but instead got folks riled enough to say "enough!". And in small towns - at least here in upstate NY and the northern tier of PA - people take their 4th of July celebrations to heart. Just about every town has fireworks, a carnival down at the Legion field, and a parade down Main Street.

Small town 4th of July parades are great fun. The parade committee chooses a theme and neighbors get together to create floats. I've seen everything from flowery princesses to a pointedly political manure spreader.  And everyone gets to participate.

Except not this year. Not in Montrose, PA. Seems that the chairman of the parade committee is censoring free speech.

This year's parade theme is "Helping Your Neighbors" - a worthy theme given that the service clubs of Kiwanis, Lions, and Rotary are sponsoring and organizing the parade.So some neighbors who have been busy helping in the community were astounded when their float application was denied.

For the past two years, these neighbors have been delivering clean drinking water to people down the road in Dimock, who have been without drinking water due to nearby drilling. They washed and waxed their water delivery truck and wanted to decorate it with some banners to let people know the "Citizens for Clean Water" are actively "helping your neighbors".

The problem seems to be that helping one's neighbors by providing fresh water is too controversial. But, hey - a couple thousand years ago the idea of feeding the hungry and clothing the poor was controversial.

Given that our country was born of a protest movement, how did we come to this moment when only "acceptable" political opinions are allowed in a parade celebrating independence from tyranny?

So this 4th of July you won't see people who have truly been helping their neighbors marching in the parade. They have been relegated to the sidelines, where they'll proudly stand with their signs and tell any and all how to get involved helping people in need. 

Bad Air, Bad Water, Bad Health

Fracking a well near home in PA

Yesterday NY State Senator David Carlucci told the press that the state senate is considering a delay of fracking until some health studies are complete. He told AP reporter Michael Gormley, "We have to put science first; we have to put the health of New Yorkers first."

Meanwhile:

• NY  Dept. of Health Commissioner Dr. Nirav Shah is still working on the health review that should determine whether the final draft SGEIS (Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement) adequately identifies potential public health impacts of fracking;
• Geisinger Health System in PA is studying the impact of Marcellus shale gas mining on health;
• DEP investigators have found two new cases in Dimock, where methane concentrations in private water wells pose an explosion hazard.

But while the NY legislators await results from those studies, there is a wealth of data indicating that gas drilling is not healthy for children and other living things. Especially living things that depend on breathing.

Consider: Pennsylvania recently completed an air pollution study. The overall results weren’t bad. But pollution from shale gas activity has brought pollution to areas that were previously unpolluted.

This reflects what’s been happening in rural areas out west. Vernal, UT saw high levels of ozone and other pollutants resulting from gas drilling. And last July, Sublette County and portions of Lincoln County WY were declared to be in marginal “non-attainment for ozone” under the Clean Air Act. That means they exceeded the federal 8-hour average threshold of 75 parts per billion (ppb), a standard meant to protect human health.

Certainly these impacts aren’t going to hit everyone equally. “Healthy” people in Fort Worth, TX for example may not feel any ill effects, but susceptible populations – children, elderly, people with chronic respiratory and/or cardiac problems – will feel the impacts. And, as has happened in a number of cases, one neighbor’s well may be contaminated while another well escapes harm – at least for a while.

As a wise and compassionate teacher reminded those who were blessed: care for the least of these (who are not so blessed)… for whatever you do for them, you do for me.

Dimock Water Still a Concern

Remember back at the end of July when the media announced that EPA had declared Dimock water "safe to drink"? Only problem was that EPA's statement that "no further action" was needed  left out an important bit of information: that their results were going to be factored into a broader health study by ATSDR (Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry).
 

The ongoing ATSDR investigation is looking at longterm risks of exposures to the contaminated water in Dimock. That's because water tests found elevated levels of heavy metals - aluminum, arsenic, barium, lithium and manganese - as well as ethylene glycol, phthalates and other volatile organic compounds, things that, notes ATSDR in a report, aren't healthy for human beings.

The ATSDR study will account for risks of long-term exposures to the water through showering, drinking, bathing and washing, as well as risks that might be compounded when people are exposed to multiple toxicants. And they will look at cumulative and synergistic effects, something that's been sorely lacking in many of the studies. Not sure when the study will be done, but you can learn more about the background in Tom Wilber's recent article.

Stories from Beneath the Shale

If you want to understand shale gas drilling, you have to start with the rock, says Tom Wilber. He should know; he covered gas drilling in NY and PA for the Press & Sun Bulletin since before the Millennium Pipeline, and now has a book out on the topic: Under the Surface: Fracking, Fortunes, and the Fate of the Marcellus Shale.  

“Everything central to shale gas production – and the controversy surrounding it – involves understanding rock fractures,” he writes. But the shale isn’t the only thing being fractured in the rush to extract gas. Wilber also writes about the drilling debate fractures communities overlying the Marcellus.

Wilber’s book is steeped in a sense of place. He describes the roads and landscape of Dimock, the trailers and homesteads and contemporary homes tucked along back roads, the stone walls and swing sets of Dimock. He introduces the Carters, the Sautners, and other families brought together unexpectedly by the shale gas rush. He grounds us in history, from the first hand-excavated gas well in Fredonia NY (1825) to the intensely industrialized horizontal hydraulically fractured Marcellus wells of the new millennium.

Under the Surface examines the geology of shale, the technology of drilling, the promise of prosperity. Wilber’s evenhanded treatment gives voice to all involved: landowners and farmers hoping to capitalize on royalty income, regulators and politicians struggling with increasingly divisive issues, and residents-turned-activists trying to protect their water and air from contamination. Even when he is talking facts, complete with endnotes and citations, he maintains his role as a storyteller... one bent on uncovering the “truth”.

His book might be finished, but Wilber isn’t; he continues to follow the issue, writing about it on his blog. “Things are happening on a daily basis,” he says, noting home rule as one of the developing issues.

He’s been keeping tabs on the recent tests of Dimock water wells conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Though the EPA reports that they have found nothing of concern, test data show “traces of sodium, methane, arsenic, chromium, and lithium and other elements at or near action levels,” he says. Those are “red flags” – they indicate a need for more analysis. As for the people in Dimock, the ones who are complaining about contaminated drinking water …  “they are victims,” says Wilber. “They certainly didn’t make this stuff up.”

Shenanigans in the Montrose Council Chambers

On Tuesday night the elected representatives of the Borough of Montrose, PA approved a laundry list of actions intended to clamp down on the public’s right to record and disseminate information about the council’s actions. The special meeting was adjourned after the council passed restrictions on how people, including journalists can engage in news-collecting by:

•    restricting public comment to borough residents and taxpayers; 
•  limiting opportunity to speak by borough residents and taxpayers to three minutes; 
• requiring video and recording devices to be located behind the last row of chairs in the meeting room; 
•  requiring video recording devices to be mounted on tripods and remain stationary and unmanned throughout the meeting; 
•  and requiring audio recording devices to also be located behind the back row and be visible.

 Press reports quote ACLU staff attorney Mary Catherine Roper as characterizing the new rules as “wacky”, saying that they go too far.

A good portion of time before the meeting even started council members tried to persuade a credentialed independent journalist to move her video camera to the back of the room. They finally ordered a policeman to take her camera – and this occurred before the new rules were voted on. Their reason: someone might trip over the tripod.

Why are the good councilors of Montrose afraid of people recording their public, open meetings? Meetings that, according to PA law anyone can attend? Meetings that, according to PA law may be recorded?

Perhaps it has to do with an agenda item listed on their February 6 meeting – an item never discussed because the meeting was brought to an abrupt halt. Item number three, listed on the agenda under “Discussion Items” was “Jessup Street, water hydrant.” Nothing dramatic about that, unless you happen to know that the Pennsylvania American Water Company placed a hydrant there, on private land, and that hydrant is being used to fill a small water truck that delivers water to Dimock residents with contaminated wells, but who aren’t receiving water deliveries from the EPA.

About one dozen people showed up that night to hear the council’s discussion regarding the hydrant. The above-mentioned indy journalist was present with her video camera. She started recording before the meeting started, without any comments from the council members. However, once the council meeting was convened, the supervisor advised that people who, for religious or other reasons didn’t want their images recorded, could leave the room. All but one council member left, abandoning the council chambers, the citizens they’ve sworn to represent, the PA state constitution and democracy. You can watch that video here.

A few days before that, journalist and film-maker Josh Fox was forcibly removed from a public hearing in the Science, Space and Technology committee in Washington DC, and arrested – an action that many Representatives decried as shameful censorship. On Feb. 15 the US Attorney dropped the case, finding it baseless and without merit. Fox said that the incident “…serves as a painful reminder that we do not have rights unless we exercise them.” You can read his entire comment here.

EPA Tests Dimock Water Despite Industry Criticism

photo provided; EPA mobile lab in Dimock, PA

As promised, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is testing water in Dimock homes. As expected, the gas industry is fighting back, claiming whatever is in that water was already there. And to further complicate the picture, Cabot Oil and Gas CEO Dan Dingles is accusing the EPA of undercutting President Barack Obama’s “commitment” to developing the nation’s shale gas reserves.

If it weren’t in the news you’d assume this was the plot of a soon-to-be-released midwinter movie.

This week two teams of scientists began sampling well water from homes in Dimock, PA – or at least the homes they’ve been given access to. Of the 66 homeowners they contacted, EPA has received permission from 55 to conduct sampling.

EPA determined that further testing was warranted after reviewing results from testing Cabot conducted last fall. Although Cabot’s tests indicated methane may no longer be an issue, the results raised the Agency’s concern about the potential health threats posed by other contaminants in the water: arsenic, barium, a plasticizer known as DEHP, glycol compounds, manganese, phenol, sodium and others. EPA admits that some of these occur naturally, but notes that all of them are associated with gas drilling.

So why aren’t the other 11 homeowners getting their water tested? For free by scientists with no ties to the oil and gas industry?

Peer pressure, say some Dimock residents. Email and Facebook comments mention intimidation and pressure from both gas industry representatives and other residents. And while industry criticism against EPA for what they consider “meddling” is to be expected, the outcry by fellow residents against their neighbors illustrates just how deeply gas drilling can divide a community.

There are residents who support Cabot’s drilling and who, either because they already have leases or are hoping to cash in on future activities, criticize the continued attention on water problems as “baseless” and “hyped-up allegations”. These are the same folks who were outraged that the PA Department of Environmental Protection ordered Cabot to build a water line to bring fresh water to Dimock – even though Cabot would foot the bill.

Apparently nixing the water line was not enough for Enough is Enough. Their most recent campaign is “Dimock Proud”, featuring signs proclaiming that “the water IS clean and the people are friendly.”

Industry-backed Energy in Depth has been posting up a storm, claiming that the water’s safe and the testing is nothing more than politics – a “decision by EPA to spend hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars supplying water to people who don’t need it.”

But, hey – didn’t the President of the United States just say, in his State of the Union address, that we should drill for more gas? Apparently that was the take-away message for Cabot CEO Dan Dinges. In a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, Dinges cited Obama’s support for domestic natural gas. He criticized EPA’s water testing in Dimock as an action that threatened to “undercut the President’s stated commitment to this important resource”.

Dinges later released another statement to the press, calling EPA’s work in Dimock “more of an attempt to advance a political agenda hostile to shale gas development rather than a principled effort to address environmental concerns in the area.”

But with a file full of Pavillion, WY tests to back them up, EPA responded that its actions are based solely on science – and the law.

As for that State of the Union comment? Anyone who was listening knows that the President emphasized that any drilling would be limited by “developing this resource without putting the health and safety of our citizens at risk.”

EPA Trucks Water to Dimock

Water Delivery on Carter Rd, Dimock. photo by Tom Frost

On Friday, January 20 the US Environmental Protection Agency showed up at the Sautner residence on Carter Road in Dimock, PA for a press conference and to deliver water. Yup, the federal agency has determined that there are 4 homes, including the Sautner’s that need replacement drinking water immediately. The reason: results from water tests raised health concerns, says EPA.

Not only are they supplying water to these four families who have been left by their state government without water since the end of November, but EPA will begin testing water supplies for 61 homes in Dimock this Monday and Tuesday.

Lots of people showed up on Friday to celebrate the water – and the raised awareness that EPA’s actions will bring to the potential for shale gas drilling to contaminate drinking water. Just last year EPA found that hydrofracking was responsible for contaminating drinking water in Pavillion, WY.

Craig Sautner thanked the EPA, but noted that water shipments is a temporary fix. The ultimate goal is to get a permanent water pipe to bring fresh water to the homeowners who can’t drill new wells in a contaminated aquifer.

Victoria Switzer, whose well has also been contaminated, criticized the PA Department of Environmental Protection for failing the citizens who lost their water due to faulty casings – for which DEP fined Cabot Oil & Gas. “I hope EPA is here to protect us,” she said, noting that she is not one of the four that EPA will be delivering to.

Filmmaker Josh Fox was also on hand. “This represents a monumental failure of Governor Corbett and the DEP,” he said, warning that similar cases of water contamination are unfolding across the state.

You can watch the press conference here.

 EPA’s documents relating to Dimock are here

EPA Promises Water for Dimock Residents & Then Backs Off

updated at 7:40 pm: AP reports EPA cancels water delivery here. they are "filling information gaps" says an EPA spokesperson...

updated at 12:14pm: Carter Road residents received phone calls from the EPA emergency services this morning, notifying them that water deliveries are not going to happen after all. When Craig Sautner asked why, he received no explanation. EPA has not responded to my request for information.

originally posted Saturday morning:

Fresh drinking water is hard to come by for some Dimock residents. Three years ago they lost their water source when drilling by Cabot Oil & Gas caused methane and, possibly, other chemicals to migrate into their home water wells.

But yesterday EPA representatives called the households and promised water will be delivered. One resident who received a phone call from EPA told me that the agency said they've contracted with a water delivery company and a delivery should come within a couple days.

“We are holding our breath waiting for the first drop of water to be delivered!” she said.

These home-owning, tax-paying citizens were left high and dry, without a reliable supply of clean water when Cabot stopped delivering water on November 30. More than a month ago.

Environmental groups and caring people have been donating water, but the deliveries have been sporadic. And with winter coming, the Dimock residents were concerned about a consistent water supply. For those scraping the bottom of the water barrel, EPA’s promise of fresh water is a prayer answered in the nick of time.