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Dear RDA Members and any former military psy-ops officers who now work for
the gas companies monitoring us,
In this vital week for the future of Pennsylvania, we focus on an upcoming
seminar, a crucial need for public comment, a lousy piece of legislation
and a rally in State College.
*PROTECTING THE AIR WE BREATHE – an evening of education and empowerment*
Please join us this Thursday evening, November 17, from 6pm – 8pm in Room
G11 of Lycoming College's Heim Science building, for a seminar on the
environmental and health impacts that gas industry operations have on our
air. You'll learn what to be concerned about and how to monitor and
participate in fighting for air quality in your region. Presented by Matt
Walker of the Clean Air Council, admission is free and open to the public.
The event is hosted by the Responsible Drilling Alliance and the Clean Air
Council. If you're coming straight from work and need a bite to eat, relax
- we'll have some snacks on hand.
*Extremely critical ACTION STEP needed now!*
Sorry to deluge you with these calls to arms lately, but the industry is
weighing in hard once again and we need to counter. If you attend the
workshop Thursday, this topic will become much clearer. Essentially, DEP is
looking for comments on a critical area of gas development, a technical
guidance document on aggregation of gas industry compressor facilities. In
December of 2010, a newly instituted technical guidance on the issue, which
was much more protective of public health and safety than the old, was
rescinded. Essentially, the replacement technical guidance does not provide
the DEP Bureau of Air Quality with the ability to adequately protect our
air resources.
Effectively, only compressor stations within one quarter mile of each
other, which are owned by the same company and have the same industry code
will be considered to be aggregated for emissions. The industry published a
"white paper" on aggregation in September of 2010. The new technical
guidance, now open to comment, is scarily similar in content to that white
paper.
The formation of ground level ozone, which is a precursor for smog, is our
concern for both permitted emissions from compressor facilities and the
massive amounts of fugitive methane emissions which even the industry
admits is around 3% of their operations. If you live in an area prone to
fog, or a hollow, or valley with a watercourse or lake in it, emissions may
be prone to travel and stall in these places. We, the breathing public, and
the DEP currently have no idea of how many compressor stations and
compressor engines we can expect to have in any given area. Reality based
aggregation of facilities is a huge fight on the federal and state levels.
Please understand that in addition to the major compressor facilities,
compressor engines may be placed on poorly producing wells, or well sites
as the field depletes.
With proper aggregation, these sites would be required to use more
effective air quality control devices and thus have lower emissions. If
stations were required to have adequate spacing requirements, there may be
a good opportunity for emissions to adequately disperse. In WV people are
already reporting health problems that adequate aggregation may have
prevented. In WY there are nonattainment areas for ground level ozone/smog
and many health related complaints.
The new technical guidance relies on judicial rulings formulated in the
early 1980s before shale gas was exploitable. The guidance is not written
for the amount of gas pipeline infrastructure, compression, and gas fields
so close to homes as we will end up with here. It is not written for many
different companies operating their own compressor stations within close
proximity.
If you are not able to understand this issue fully, please contact us with
questions but, please, take the time and write a public comment. E-mail us:
i...@responsibledrillingalliance.org or better yet, attend the workshop
Thursday.
The industry is pulling out all stops to get what suits their bottom line,
obviously the Governor, the clueless head of the DEP, and legislature are
all deluded on this issue. Industry already succeeded in having this
guidance proposal reflect their white paper very closely. We need to send
emails and regular mail to the DEP, PRONTO! With a sufficient quantity of
personal letters, it will be hard for DEP, even under Michael Krancer, not
to address the issue in a way that offers more protection for our health.
*THIS IS AN ISSUE WE CAN GAIN GROUND ON, IF WE ALL WEIGH IN. Please send
this information on to your sphere of influence.*
RDA thanks Emily Krafjack of Wyoming County for her tireless efforts on
this issue, and for informing us of this comment opportunity.
*WHERE TO SEND YOUR COMMENTS:* Submit written comments on this interim
final technical guidance document by November 21, 2011. The Department will
accept comments submitted by e-mail, but comments submitted by facsimile
will not be accepted. A return name and address must be included in each
e-mail transmission. Written comments should be submitted to Krishnan
Ramamurthy, Department of Environmental Protection, Bureau of Air Quality,
P.O. Box 8468, Harrisburg, PA 17105-8468 or email kramamu...@pa.gov.
*EMAIL FORMAT*
*TO:* kramamu...@pa.gov
*SUBJECT: Air Aggregation for Oil and Gas INTERIM TECHNICAL GUIDANCE
DOCUMENT*
Add your comments here
*Your Name
Street Address*
*LEGISLATING OUR FUTURE AWAY*
On November 15th, the Senate passed a lousy piece of legislation, SB1100.
This bill effectively eliminates one of the most basic principles of
democracy – the right of a free people to self determination at the local
level.
We can't emphasize enough our loathing toward this industry-led dilution of
the local control over the placement of gas industry operations.
Myron Arnowitt, State Director for Clean Water Action succinctly summed up
the assault on local control, "Unfortunately, the State Senate passed SB
1100 Tuesday night, by a vote of 29-20. The vote was largely party line.
Included in the bill was language that greatly restricts municipal rights
to enact zoning ordinances for gas drilling. SB 1100 has a new set of
requirements for any local zoning ordinance, including requiring townships
to allow drilling in all zones, including in residential areas. While most
of the press on this focused on the new role of the Attorney General in
determining the legality of zoning ordinances, it is the new strict
requirements for any zoning ordinance that are disastrous. Many townships
will find their current ordinances declared illegal if SB 1100 is signed
into law. In further bad news (sorry – I'm just the messenger!), debate on
the House side on HB 1950 continued. A Republican amendment was passed (110
– 85) which removed the complete prohibition on local ordinances from the
bill. However, it replaced it with language that was reported to be very
similar to what is in SB 1100. This is hardly a step forward, and in fact
sets the stage for an agreement between House and Senate on restricting
local zoning.
"What next? The House will likely complete work on HB 1950 with a final
vote on Wednesday sometime. We need to keep pushing House members to vote
NO on HB 1950, and to support any amendments that would take out the
language restricting municipal ordinances. If the House ends up passing HB
1950, there will likely be some kind of closed door negotiating between
House and Senate (and Governor) to come up with some common bill that will
go back to both chambers for another vote. This would likely be the week of
December 5, as the Senate won't be back in session until then. So, we will
have more time to work on creating some backlash between now and then."
*MARCELLUS PROTEST: Nov. 18 – State College PA*
*"Power to the People NOT the Corporations "*, a protest by citizens from
all over the state will be held at the Penn State University main campus
this Friday. A rally will be held on the steps of Old Main from noon until
1:00pm. This permitted event will celebrate the efforts of several local
groups to pass a voter referendum on November 8th that affirms the State
College community's environmental rights and bans any future natural gas
drilling in State College. UPDATE: The referendum passed by an overwhelming
71%!
Speakers include RDA's own Barb Jarmoska. An open letter to the Penn State
Board of Trustees will be delivered expressing concerns about the large
amounts and non-disclosure of funding that the University has accepted from
the natural gas industry and its effect on the objectivity of this
taxpayer-funded state university.
A second rally, from 1:30 – 3:30pm, will be held at the Penn State
Conference Center, which will be hosting the Marcellus Summit 2011
sponsored by Range Resources and Chesapeake Energy, among others.
PS: If you fail to grasp the significance of the salutation of this
newsletter, here's some interesting reading: *Drillers' use of
'counterinsurgency' tactics against opponents ...*
