Fracking The Amish

Jesus said, "Turn the other cheek". So if you are of the Amish faith you prefer to settle legal disputes within your own community, without litigation. In other words the Amish will not sue, and if you're a natural gas company, that's very good news. Turns out that whole "Amish Mafia" thing might be blown out of proportion.

To say that many natural gas companies are taking advantage of people of the Amish faith would be an understatement. In an article written for the New Republic, Molly Redden shares a story where an Amish couple was paid $10 an acre to have a natural gas company come in and start fracking. The couple was told that that was the best offer the company could make. Turns out neighboring farm were receiving upwards of $1,000 an acre. Rather than take legal action, because by their faith they cannot, the Amish couple admits they made a mistake and have to live with it.

This is just one of many similar instances. Not only did the Amish family lose out on a ton of cash, but they also put their farm, crops, and livestock in danger, and unknowingly jeopardized their livelihood due to the chemicals used in the fracking process. Check out the documentary Gas Land for a good idea of this.

The Amish couple did indeed make a colossal mistake, and should have done some investigating on their own. But they were also intentionally misled and outright lied to by a billion-dollar company that can afford to be honest. With the advent of hydraulic fracturing or fracking, this is the process of fracturing rock layers using a pressurized chemical mixture to release natural gas, natural gas companies are tapping into natural gas holds that were once unobtainable. This has created a massive boom in the natural gas industry and has taken the natural companies to Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, places with large Amish populations .

With the knowledge that the Amish will not sue, this really opens the door for gas companies to do whatever they want without the risk of legal action. The impact of this is enormous. Other than outright lying about land value, let's say a lease ends and the company just keeps on fracking; the Amish can do nothing legally. It is easy to see how this can get really bad and fast.

The Amish do have certain options though. For example, one Amish family that was a victim of an undervalued lease took the gas company to court to simply void the lease. What makes this acceptable for the Amish couple is that there is no money involved - they just want the gas company to leave.

This isn't capitalism; this is wrong. From causing earthquakes to lighting water on fire, fracking has serious health and environmental complications not entirely understood yet. People But if people are willing to take these enormous risks with their land, they should at the very least be paid well for it. Those who constantly step up to defend the actions of oil companies should ask themselves; if gas companies willing to mislead, ripoff, and outright break contracts with the Amish, is there anything these scumbags won't do?

Source: New Republic

Andrew Meggison was born in the state of Maine and educated in Massachusetts. Andrew earned a Bachelor's Degree in Government and International Relations from Clark University and a Master's Degree in Political Science from Northeastern University. Being an Eagle Scout, Andrew has a passion for all things environmental. In his free time Andrew enjoys writing, exploring the great outdoors, a good film, and a creative cocktail. You can follow Andrew on Twitter @AndrewMeggison

The post Fracking The Amish appeared first on Gas 2.

http://gas2.org/2013/06/13/fracking-the-amish

T. Boone Pickens says: Let's transform energy with Natural Gas

Mr. Pickens says from the outset that he believes in global warming, which I must assume he means to say human caused global warming.  He then launches into a pitch to sell us on a large-scale switch to natural gas to fuel our society.  Natural gas is a fossil fuel, and will only continue the path of global warming.   While Natural Gas is routinely believed to be cleaner, some research has shown it isn't, especially in the first stage after a frack-job when there's a lot of methane escaping into the atmosphere.

His approach is from national energy security.  The current dominance of oil to fuel our society of course undermines the U.S. national security, because oil is located in countries that aren't exactly friendly to the U.S.  Mr. Pickens calls these countries The Enemy, and one gathers that he thinks any OPEC country is part of that Enemy.  The numbers are that $3 trillion per year goes into buying fossil fuels, and of that amount $1 trillion flows to OPEC, which Mr. Pickens calls the Greatest Transfer of Wealth in History.  But, yes, of course, this is funding countries that are not friendly to the U.S.  Why, then, do the Republican politicians want to keep us on the fossil oil bandwagon?

Mr. Pickens claims there is plenty of natural gas available.  The technology enabling this is hydraulic fracturing.  In his view there's nothing wrong with that technology, he's done thousands of frack-jobs and not had a problem.  There's a lot of people who disagree with him.

His position is one of hypocrisy.  On the one hand he believes in global warming, on the other hand he's pushing a fuel that will continue the fossil fuel dependency behind human caused global warming.  The causitive factor to human caused global warming is digging up ancient fossil fuels and burning them, releasing more carbon into the ecosphere.  The way to stop this is to stop using fossil fuels.

But could natural gas be a bridge fuel to get us somewhere?  That's the core of his pitch, that it's a bridge fuel, and because he's an old guy that's about to die, he doesn't care about where that bridge leads.  It's up to us to solve the problems of adopting natural gas on a big scale.

There is already a large-scale adoption of natural gas in big trucks, as Mr. Pickens suggests.  The big trucks represent a large amount of fossil fuel/oil use, and because they're running dirty diesel engines the air pollution from those trucks is horrible and known to be carcinogenic.  His suggestion is that natural gas is cleaner than diesel, making it a better fuel.  But, what if our society adopts natural gas and then stops there?  We'll still be on the path of human caused global warming.

Geothermal from "dry hot rocks" as an abundant baseload energy resource?

Interesting video .. Geothermal energy demonstration project in Australia where they've developed an improved geothermal production process.

Unlike most "alternative" "clean" electricity resources, geothermal is great for "baseload". That is, wind or solar power is intermittent and would require massive electricity storage systems to be a proper replacement for coal plants. The advantage of coal plants is they run all day long every day all year long. The modern energy miracle includes the electricity always being there all day long every day all year long.

"Baseload" power is those electricity resources that run all the time. This doesn't mean there isn't a place for solar because it's peak of production is in the afternoon when the peak demand occurs. But for Solar electricity to provide the baseload means somehow storing electricity gathered during the day to spend that electricity at night.

I have a couple quibbles about the video ... Mainly, where does the water come from? And their description of the process sounds like hydraulic fracturing, but in this case meant to gather steam rather than gather natural gas.

This demonstration project is installed way out in the Australian Desert. It shows them pumping water underground, the water heats up and returns as steam, to run geothermal turbines, and the steam is then vented to the atmosphere. This means the plant is sucking down water 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, in a desert. Where will the water come from?

It's hydraulic fracturing ... clearly .. because the video describes having created a horizontal area from which they gather steam.

Finally I've gathered from other geothermal projects there are sometimes toxic chemicals coming from underground carried by the steam.

All that said - it could very well be a valuable and valuable electricity production resource.

Facts on Fracking - a video series by Friends of the Jordan

Friends of the Jordan is hosting a series of educational videos on the subject of fracking. This process, used to extract natural gas from shale, is being promoted in Northern Michigan. The series of videos below are from a 2 hour presentation by Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University. He is a long time scientist in the fossil fuel industry who appears to have had a change of heart and is giving an in-depth warning about the process and what can go wrong.

For more information on Fracking, see: Hydraulic Fracturing

Facts on Fracking - How is it Different

This segment explains how it is different from conventional natural gas wells. The speaker is Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University.

Facts on Fracking - Drilling the Well

This segment explains how the wells are drilled and the fracking . The speaker is Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University.

Facts on Fracking - How Safe is it?

This segment explains safety issues that have been part of the fracking process since its inception . The speaker is Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University.

Facts on Fracking - How Much Ground Does it Cover?

This segment deals with the number of wells needed to make extraction of natural gas profitable. The speaker is Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University.

Facts on Fracking - What Can Go Wrong?

This segment explains the many things that in go wrong in the multi-stage process. The speaker is Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University.

Facts on Fracking - What is the Science?

This segment explains the scientific study that has been done, some by Dr. Ingraffea, of fracture mechanics and how the industry applies it out in the field. The speaker is Dr. Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University.

Videos on the Bradford County fracking accident

Earlier this week a major hydraulic fracturing accident occurred in Pennsylvania (see: The fracking accident on the anniversary of the Gulf Oil Spill). The youtube site has several informative videos.

Bradford County PA, 90 miles west of the Delaware River Basin, shows us the face of shale gas drilling's industrialization in ruined air and drinking water. Photographed by Jane Prettyman (with apologies for soviet camera), host of 'Public Comment' (pubcomm.blogspot.com). Music: "Wheels" by Jason Shaw (Creative Commons) and "Sacrifice" by Lisa Gerrard and Pieter Bourke.

This video is "Bradford County Commissioner McLinko at the Marcellus Shale Advosory Commission" speaking about conditions in his county. This was recorded Mar 25, 2011 (before the fracking explosion). His view is jobs, jobs, jobs, damn the consequences.

Inhofe Claims Fracking Has 'Never Poisoned Anyone' Nor Ever Contaminated Groundwater: He refers explicitly to the accident in Bradford County saying it was "above ground" (hence not groundwater) and a bunch of other quibblish things.

The Commonwealth Foundation spoke to many people impacted by the Marcellus Shale drilling activity in and around Bradford County, Pennsylvania. Residents from Bradford County speak out about the proposed natural gas severance tax.

The fracking accident on the anniversary of the Gulf Oil Spill

Earlier this week a natural gas well blew up while undergoing hydraulic fracturing (a.k.a. fracking) causing a spill of fracking fluids. Supposedly it's been cleaned up and there's nothing to be seen. Really?

That it happened on the anniversary of last years oil spill is causing some to point at the irony, but it's obviously one of those coincidences that sometimes happen. Rather than point at coincidences what this makes me think of is my blog post from a few weeks ago following the beginning of the still-ongoing nuclear meltdown - This world doesn't have to become an uninhabitable nuclear radiation poisoned wasteland - This world also doesn't have to be fracked over by the natural gas companies, and that: Change starts "here" with "you" and "me"

Like several previous examples (nuclear meltdown, oil spill, etc) this is an example of the environmental cost coming from the fossil fuels we use to power this wondrous life we have. The following should serve as a reminder to that cost, but you can see below most of the discussion going on is the environmental effect of the spill and who has the responsibility for the accident.

See also: Videos on the Bradford County fracking accident

Pennsylvania natgas well has blowout during fracking (April 20, 2011):

A natural gas well spilled thousands of gallons of hydraulic fracking drilling fluid water in Pennsylvania..after a blowout..began spewing fluid at 11.45 p.m...during the controversial "fracking" drilling process which involves blasting shale rock with water, sand and chemicals to release trapped natural gas.."An equipment failure occurred during well-completion activities, allowing the release of completion fluids," Chesapeake said in a statement. ... fluid initially spilled into a nearby waterway ... Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has tested the water and found no adverse affects on aquatic life as yet ...

The same article refers to an earlier accident 2 months ago when another Chesapeake owned well had a spill of fracking fluids.

Fracking fluid leak stops at Pa. gas well (April 22, 2011):

A gas well in Pennsylvania is no longer leaking after two days of efforts to stop hydraulic fracturing fluid and natural gas from escaping.. While the cause of the Tuesday blowout of the well in Bradford Country is unclear, well operator Chesapeake Energy said it has suspended all post-drilling activity on its wells in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio while they investigate why the well malfunctioned

Chesapeake seeks permanent plug for natgas well (April 22, 2011):

Chesapeake Energy is looking for options to plug permanently a Pennsylvania natural gas well following a blowout this week that sent drilling fluid into local waterways.... [they] used a mix of plastic, ground-up tires and heavy mud on Thursday as a temporary plug for the well, which had spewed thousands of gallons of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, fluid into the surrounding area.... company, which had 87 active wells in Pennsylvania in the second half of 2010, has halted all fracking activities in the state following the blowout. ...

An April 20 blog post on the NRDC website points out Bradford County, where this blowout occurred, there are "reports that up to 100 households have had their drinking water wells contaminated by natural gas production operations" and calls it "one of the communities across the nation currently serving as guinea pigs in the new rush to exploit natural gas reserves without adequate regulation or oversight." Another week in natural gas drilling, another fracking blow-out

That blog post referred back to one from April 12, 2011 Pennsylvania continues to lead the pack with news of inadequate oil and gas regulation

Pennsylvania remains the poster child for things that can go wrong when producing oil or gas....contamination of drinking water wells in northwestern Pennsylvania...reports that up to 100 households in Bradford County have had their drinking water wells contaminated by gas production operations...Two houses exploded in Bradford Township... [which may be due to] some type of thermogenic gas migration caused by extensive drilling ... U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials pushed Pennsylvania regulators to consider re-evaluating all permits for wastewater treatment plants that are accepting drilling or fracking waste and adding stricter standards for testing of radionuclides and other contaminants... Pennsylvania oil and gas inspectors trying to enforce state rules on drilling in the Marcellus Shale have been prohibited from issuing violations unless they have gotten the approval of a senior state official... Carmichaels Municipal Authority recently issued an advisory for residents to boil their water because it had to lower chlorine treatment in order to reduce the levels of trihalomethanes, which can cause cancer .. [which]is being caused by high levels of bromide in the Monongahela River, resulting from natural gas wastewater

Pennsylvania Natural Gas Blowout Spills Thousands of Gallons of Toxic Wastewater into Local Community (April 20, 2011)

Chesapeake Energy Corporation lost control of its Marcellus Shale well near Canton, Pennsylvania. The company reports that a piece of equipment failed during the hyrdraulic fracturing process. As a result, thousands of gallons of chemical-laden water have spilled out from the well into nearby fields and farms.... From their entire land holding, Chesapeake has designated 2.5 million acres for shale gas development. The company estimates it holds 15,800 drilling locations capable of producing 7.7 trillion cubic feet of proven reserves and 64 trillion cubic feet of risked unproven reserves. Furthermore, over the next two years, the company plans to make significant investments in building its capacity to hydraulically fracture its wells...Unconventional extraction of natural gas is conducted using the controversial drilling technique hydraulic fracturing or fracking. There are significant environmental concerns surrounding hydraulic fracturing, primarily regarding the disposal of the toxic drilling water which is injected to break up the rock formations and release the gas.

Pennsylvania Gas-Well Blowout Forces Evacuation (April 20, 2011)

According to both Chesapeake and local officials, the well had already been drilled when the accident occurred and was in the process of being hydraulically fractured, a process in which millions of gallons of water and chemicals are injected into the ground to crack open gas-bearing rocks....Francis Roupp, deputy director of the Bradford County Emergency Management Agency, said "many thousands of gallons" spilled from the well, but he said much of the fluid was successfully contained on the site. He said recent rains also meant Towanda Creek was full, diluting any contamination....Mr. Roupp said he didn't know what chemicals were in the water....A report released by Congressional Democrats last week said fracturing fluid often contains carcinogens and other harmful chemicals....Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has been especially controversial. Environmental groups fear the process can contaminate drinking-water supplies....This isn't the first fracturing-related accident in Pennsylvania. In a similar incident last June, workers lost control of a well in western Pennsylvania owned by EOG Resources Inc. That incident blew water and chemicals 75 feet into the air but caused only moderate environmental damage, according to state officials at the time...."How many of these can you have?" said David Masur, executive director of PennEnvironment, which has called for a ban on hydraulic fracturing until drillers demonstrate better safety practices. "You've played Russian Roulette. You've spun the revolver too many times. People's lives are on the line."

That article (from the Wall Street Journal) reads like a downplaying of the problems, echoing the industry's emphasis on small concentrations and minimal effect. The fact is the chemicals are carcinogenic and are being spilled into drinking water supplies.

The WJS article referred to an earlier spill: Marcellus blowout sprays gas in Clearfield County (June 5, 2010)

A 16-hour natural gas leak at a Clearfield County well started with the first reported blowout during statewide exploration of the Marcellus shale, but it won't halt drilling in the gas-rich layers underground, state officials said Friday.

Natural gas and wastewater shot 75 feet into the air Thursday night after drillers encountered unexpectedly high gas pressure in the well about 10 miles north of Interstate 80, just outside Moshannon State Forest. Crews from a contractor hired by well operator EOG Resources capped it at noon yesterday. No no one was hurt.

There are no homes within a mile of the site, and crews dug a trench to stop chemicals in the water from entering groundwater, according to the state Department of Environmental Protection.

... "I can't guarantee that it won't happen again," Hanger said. "But I can guarantee we are doing everything possible to make sure it won't happen again."

... In the past two years, Pennsylvania has granted about 3,400 Marcellus shale drilling permits, with more than 1,500 wells drilled, some in populated areas. Government officials have promoted gas drilling as a way to raise revenue from taxes and land-leasing royalties. Environmentalists have decried shale drilling, saying chemicals in the wastewater used to fracture underground rock and free natural gas can contaminate the land.

Pennsylvania Fracking Accident: What Went Wrong (April 21, 2011)

The leak happened at the Atgas 2H well in rural Leroy Township... the failure occurred late Tuesday night when Chesapeake was in the middle of a "frack job." The controversial practice, essential to the extraction of gas from shale, involves pumping up to a million gallons of water treated with biocides, lubricants, surfactants and stabilizers a mile or more into the ground at pressures exceeding 9000 psi. ... believe they have pinpointed the initial cause of the accident: A steel coupling located beneath the well's blowout protector, but above ground, appears to have failed ...

(The blowout protector is the same technology as device that failed in the case of the BP oil spill. It didn't fail here, but if it had, both natural gas and water would have spewed forth from the well. However above-ground wells are much easier to shut down than those deep underwater.)

Marcellus wells typically regurgitate between 30 and 50 percent of the water pumped into them. In normal circumstances, it comes back in a manageable flow, and the well operators collect it in pits or tanks.... in Pennsylvania, the geology is not suited for deep-well injection, and so the water is kept in pits and tanks where it is treated to remove chemicals that are added by the drillers. It also must be stripped of contaminants it picks up while underground: bromides, chlorides and some heavy metals.

... when the coupling failed at Atgas 2H, the water simply came gushing too fast for Chesapeake's operators to bring it under control and collect it. Making matters worse, days of steady rain had partially filled the containment pits and they quickly overflowed ...

Chesapeake gets DEP notice of violation after well incident (April 23, 2011)

The state Department of Environmental Protection wants answers from Chesapeake Energy Corp. about Tuesday night's blowout incident at the company's natural gas well site in LeRoy Twp.

The state agency sent a notice of violation, dated Friday, to Chesapeake Energy requesting further information, including a complete list of materials in the fracking fluids used at the site. The agency asked Chesapeake to submit a written response to the notice within five business days.

One of the instructions in the notice informs Chesapeake to "include an explanation of why it took Chesapeake nearly 12 hours to address the uncontrolled release of fluids off the well pad."

Another calls for "a description of immediate actions taken by Chesapeake to regain control of the well and secure the wellhead, as well as any measures taken to ensure public safety."
...

RFK, Jr.: Oil Industry Trying to Silence "Gasland" Director

A few years ago it seemed the U.S. was past its peak of natural gas production. Until the fossil fuel industry developed what they're calling "Hydraulic Fracturing" or Frakking. Which just gets us Battlestar Galactica fans giggling. But let's not go there and stay focused on the story. A recent movie, Gasland, has come out really slamming the "Hydraulic Fracturing" process, showing the poisoning of the environment, showing people who can set their tap water on fire, etc. Yup, able to set their tap water on fire. What's in that water for it to be flammable, and how can the tap water possibly be safe? Why wouldn't the EPA be leaning on the municipal water systems in question?

In any case an interview by RFK Jr of Gasland's director, Josh Fox, is claiming that the fossil fuel industry is working the system to keep his movie from being aired, and in every way keeping it out of the public eye. The implication is the fossil fuel industry wants to keep us as sheep, thinking that natural gas is cleaner, that every thing is fine, nothing to worry about, and they don't want this movie disturbing the serenity of current state of affairs.

As an incumbent industry the fossil fuel providers have a fiduciary responsibility to ensure they are free to sell their product to the population. There's laws saying that business leaders are responsible to share-holders to maintain the health of the business, keep it growing, keep the share price in upward motion, and so on. That may well mean that the fossil fuel industry is using their money to create clout to preserve the status quo where we continue using their product. Even though that product is demonstrably poisonous in all ways.