by Tom Kenworthy
Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s energy plan for the nation is deeply flawed on many different levels, as Climate Progress has already noted.
One item that stands out among all the craziness is his ludicrous claim that the oil and gas industry has a perfect record of safe drilling as it has adopted the now widespread practice of hydraulic fracturing. “The EPA’s war on American fossil fuel production comes despite the fact they can’t point to a single incident of unsafe hydraulic fracturing of natural gas,” he said in his speech today in Pittsburgh.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking as it is commonly known, is a technique – unregulated at the federal level under the Safe Drinking Water Act – in which drillers use a blend of water, sand and chemicals to stimulate gas and oil production by pumping the mixture at high pressure into underground rock formations. That fractures the rock and releases hydrocarbons.
As natural gas production has swelled with the discovery of vast new reserves in shale formations across many parts of the U.S., so too have reports of methane and chemical contamination of domestic underground water supplies and streams and rivers.
The oil and gas industry has long maintained that there has never been a single proven case linking fracking to the contamination of underground drinking water supplies. Fracking takes place thousands of feet below drinking water supplies, and the chemicals used cannot penetrate intervening levels of rock, the industry asserts.
But the New York Times reported in August that in fact there is a documented case of such contamination by the EPA.
And Perry’s broader claim of safety overlooks the many examples in which drilling may have led to public health and safety threats other than hydraulic fluid contamination of underground drinking water supplies. Those include instances when methane has migrated into domestic water supplies, and surface spills of chemicals.
ProPublica, a non-profit investigative journalism organization, has done extensive reporting on fracking over the past few years, and has “uncovered more than a thousand reports of water contamination from drilling across the country, some from surface spills and some from seepage underground.”
An EPA investigation into complaints of drinking water contamination near Pavillion, Wyoming, a town where drilling is extensive, led last year to regulators warning residents not to drink the water and to ventilate their homes when showering or washing clothes. According to ProPublica, “Researchers found benzene, metals, naphthalene, phenols and methane in wells and in groundwater. They also confirmed the presence of other compounds that they had tentatively identified last summer and that may be linked to drilling activities.”
Regulators in Pennsylvania have recently leveled large fines against energy companies for methane contamination of water supplies, including a $900,000 fine against Chesapeake Energy Corp. and a $4.1 million fine against Cabot Oil and Gas Corporation.
A recent probe by the Denver Post found that four oil and gas companies recognized by state regulators as “outstanding operators” had been responsible for 350 spills in less than two years. “A Denver Post analysis in progress has found that spills are happening at the rate of seven a week – releasing more than 2 million gallons this year of diesel, oil, drilling wastewater and chemicals,” the paper reported. “Yet state regulators rarely penalize companies responsible for spills.
Health problems reported by residents living in close proximity to drilling hot spots in four states are extensive, ProPublica found in another report.
“In some communities it has been a disaster,” said Christopher Portier, director of the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) and the National Center for Environmental Health. “We do not have enough information on hand to be able to draw good solid conclusions about whether this is a public health risk as a whole.”
– By Tom Kenworthy, Senior Fellow at American Progress.
Previous in TP Climate Progress
Language Intelligence: Lessons on persuasion from Jesus, Shakespeare, Lincoln, and Lady Gaga
It’s probably simpler for Perry to lie.
Vent your house when you shower! Benzene and such will be absorbed by the skin, the largest organ in the body!
The report will not stop Perry from lying about the record. This a juggernaut that can only be stopped by a change in energy usage, most people won’t care until their water gets polluted.
I hope I’m not being too depressing but that’s the way this country has been and cheap energy is what fuels this mindset. Of course it’s wrong but look at Perry, he’s making money off it so he’s not going to change his tune.
A Simple Plan
Here is a simple, direct plan:
You remember all those atmospheric scientists and climate scientists from Texas A&M and the entire state of Texas who wrote the editorial about climate change a year or so ago? They should do this:
1. Send a clear, science-based (but in plain English) letter to Rick Perry telling him, in essence, that climate change is real, that he doesn’t have a clue what he’s talking about, and that he’s doing a great disservice to Texans and to humankind when he denies the reality or importance of climate change. Send the letter to Perry, send it to key news outlets, send it to Romney, and call a press conference to announce it.
2. In particular, send the letter to Fox News. Send it to several key departments at Fox News, and call them to follow-up to make sure they got it and to explain its importance. A few of the scientists should go to the local Fox News bureau and deliver it in person. In other words, make sure that Fox cannot possibly say that they didn’t get it or understand it. Eliminate any reasonable excuses that Fox might try to invent for not covering the matter.
3. See if Fox covers the matter. Give them a week, with follow-up calls as necessary.
4. Give the letter, along with a list of all the things you’ve done to make Perry and Fox aware of the letter, to CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, and Joe.
5. Follow up until one of two things happens: either Fox covers the matter sufficiently; or the other media outlets cover the matter sufficiently, not only about the original letter itself (from the scientists to Perry) but also about the fact that Fox had the letter, knew about it, and chose not to cover it.
THESE are the types of things that people have to do at this point. As poor as the media outlets are — all of them — they are at least in competition with each other. That means that if CNN, MSNBC, and The New York Times learn that Fox didn’t cover what should be a Big Story about Perry and climate change, they can (and should be happy to) make a story out of the fact that Fox didn’t cover the story. In other words, if we are smart, tactical, and persistent, if the Texas A&M and other Texan climate scientists send a letter to Perry, make it available, and call attention to it, then we ultimately ought to be able to get good coverage of the matter, one way or the other. The scientific organizations should help.
Indeed, the scientific organizations should be inserting themselves into the discussion. At this point, inserting oneself (a scientist or scientific organization) into the dialogue, and correcting politicians who dis-inform or confuse the public, should not be seen as “getting political” or “entering into politics”. Not at all. Instead, it should be seen as a vital part (at this point) of the basic responsibility of scientists and scientific institutions to help make sure that the public has an informed understanding of important matters of science. Period. Science is not “for” staying in labs. It’s not “for” going into a book to stay there, unread. It’s not “for” the careers of scientists, or for grants. It’s not merely or mainly “for” making new consumer or industrial gadgets, to make money. Instead, the main aims of science are, or should be, to gain genuine understanding and to USE that understanding to improve human (and other) wellness, health, sustainability, and etc. It falls within the scientific mission to play a vital role in helping to make sure that disinformation and misunderstanding of matters of science don’t detract from human well-being, sustainability, and so forth. And that is just what’s taking place, and Perry is one of the chief culprits. So, scientists, speak up.
Someone with a platform — Joe? — ought to contact those scientists at Texas A&M and encourage them to stand up for science and stand up for human well-being. The national scientific organizations ought to help. Otherwise we are just spinning our wheels. Someone — and more and more people — needs to begin to step up to the plate and swing.
I’ve highlighted a simple plan. It’s doable.
Be Well,
Jeff
Is Global Warming in the Bible?
I think the end of the world by fire is.
Maybe that counts?
Rick Perry officials spark revolt after doctoring environment report
Scientists ask for names to be removed after mentions of climate change and sea-level rise taken out by Texas officials
By academic standards, the protest amounts to the beginnings of a rebellion: every single scientist associated with the 200-page report has demanded their names be struck from the document. “None of us can be party to scientific censorship so we would all have our names removed,” said Jim Lester, a co-author of the report and vice-president of the Houston Advanced Research Centre.
“To me it is simply a question of maintaining scientific credibility. This is simply antithetical to what a scientist does,” Lester said. “We can’t be censored.” Scientists see Texas as at high risk because of climate change, from the increased exposure to hurricanes and extreme weather on its long coastline to this summer’s season of wildfires and drought.
However, Perry, in his run for the Republican nomination, has elevated denial of science, from climate change to evolution, to an art form. He opposes any regulation of industry, and has repeatedly challenged the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency.
Texas is the only state to refuse to sign on to the federal government’s new regulations on greenhouse gas emissions. “I like to tell people we live in a state of denial in the state of Texas,” said John Anderson, an oceanography at Rice University, and author of the chapter targeted by the government censors.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/oct/14/rick-perry-texas-censorship-environment-report?newsfeed=true