PE Magazine, April 2010, Concepts: ‘Fracing,’ PEs, and Advocacy

July 29, 2011

PE Magazine, April 2010, Concepts: ‘Fracing,’ PEs, and Advocacy.

‘Fracing,’ PEs, and Advocacy

BY ANTHONY R. INGRAFFEA, P.E.

ANTHONY R. INGRAFFEA, P.E.Kathy Caldwell, president of the American Society of Civil Engineers, wrote recently, “The profession of civil engineering involves more than engineering practice. It also involves, in part, thoughtful consideration of issues affecting the health and safety of the public.” This assertion is consistent with the NSPE Code of Ethics’ first canon: to “hold paramount the safety, health, and welfare of the public.” These statements are coming into play in many areas of the country where a major engineering project is underway—unconventional natural gas development from shale formations using high-volume hydraulic fracturing, or “fracing.”

A recent poll by the Civil Society Institute found that 45% of Americans are already very or somewhat aware of controversies about fracing. For some professional engineers, “thoughtful consideration” of this issue might evolve into advocacy.

Filed under Right vs Wrong

‪HRW trip to Pa to see Hydrofracking – entire interview 7 18 11‬‏ – YouTube

July 25, 2011

‪HRW trip to Pa to see Hydrofracking – entire interview 7 18 11‬‏ – YouTube.  Hydro Relief Web

On July 16th 2011, a group of people from Oneida County, New York drove to Bradford County, Pennsylvania to see the process of Hydrofracking for themselves. The trip was organized by Hydro Relief Web
Three of the people who attended (Toshia Hance Bonnie Jones Reynolds and Carleton Corey) were later interviewed by Reporter/Anchor Gary Liberatore from WKTV news Channel 2. This video is the extended form of that interview.

Reporting that Tonawanda resident that the local newspaper has told her not to write anymore letters to the editor about hydrofracking because the paper will not print them.

Filed under Community Impacts, Health, Right vs Wrong, Video, Water Tagged with , ,

Shale Force–Syracuse New Times July 20, 2011

July 25, 2011 2 Comments

Shale Force.

Shale Force

By Ed Griffin-Nolan  

Bill Fischer moved to Central New York last year to get away from the noise and the risks of hydrofracking near his home in Pennsylvania. He has a simple message for people in Central New York about natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale: “It’s coming, whether you like it or not, so you better be ready.


Relocated here from northern Pennsylvania, Bill Fischer considers himself a fugitive from hydrofrackingBy Ed Griffin-Nolan

Bill Fischer moved to Central New York last year to get away from the noise and the risks of hydrofracking near his home in Pennsylvania. He has a simple message for people in Central New York about natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale: “It’s coming, whether you like it or not, so you better be ready.”

In the basement of the house in DeWitt that Fischer and his wife, Debbie, just bought hangs a framed picture of the home they left behind in rural northeast Pennsylvania. Seen in the aerial photograph the house sits on the edge of a lake that measures 92 acres surrounded by lush forest. Silver Lake, near Brackney, Pa., 14 miles of back roads south of Binghamton, was home to the Fischers for 13 years, until the advent of hydrofracking convinced them it was time to leave.

Fischer is a 64-year-old former New York state trooper who has the mind of a detective and speaks with the authority of a judge.

Since 1980, when a tangle with a suspect led to his early retirement with a disability, he has run his own private investigative firm, William Fischer Forensic Consulting, specializing in the reconstruction of crime scenes. He enlisted in the Marines during Vietnam, serving his time mostly in the Mediterranean.

Sitting on the three-season porch of his new home on a cul de sac just a few blocks from the spot where East Genesee Street crosses under Interstate 481, his aging golden retriever Nellie at his feet, Fischer describes the idyllic scene he left behind just south of the New York-Pennsylvania line. At regular intervals he interrupts himself to talk of his recent passion: long, early summer bike rides through southern Onondaga County. Recounting mornings spent cycling through the hills of Jamesville and Pompey and past the dairy farms of Fabius, Fischer sounds like a man who has discovered a new love late in life. But when he talks about the place he left behind, a wistful sadness emerges in his voice.

“We lived on State Route 167, 100 feet from the road, and 500 feet from the lake,” he says. “It was a quiet country road. I could sit on my porch and watch five eagles fishing the lake.”

Last November, all that changed as Williams Oil Company set up shop to drill for natural gas. Like much of New York’s Southern Tier and a large swath of Pennsylvania, Silver Lake sits atop a rock formation so packed with fossilized vaporized energy that it is frequently referred to as the Saudi Arabia of natural gas. The race to get the gas out of the ground and into a pipeline changed Bill Fischer’s life forever.

“Sixty trucks an hour came by the house, 10 hours a day, for three weeks. Every time they came to the top of the hill they downshifted, sending up a puff of diesel that cooled and then settled back down right in my front yard. That was just to put in the pad. The pad was a mile and a half from the house, directly across from Salt Springs State Park. They planned to place 10 wells on the pad.”

That subterranean rock formation—the Marcellus Shale—is what we share with the people of Susquehanna County, Pa., the place Fischer left behind. The shale is either a blessing or a curse, depending on who you speak with. For Fischer, it depends on how we handle it and, he reminds us, it’s not going away any time soon.

The gas entombed by the Marcellus Shale sits thousands of feet below the earth and the only technology yet discovered that can exhume it—high volume hydraulic fracturing (fracking for short)—brings with it heavy baggage. Fracking involves shooting millions of gallons of pressurized water and sand, laced with chemicals, into the formation. While fracking breaks up the shale and forces the gas up, questions of where all the water will come from, how it will be altered by its use in the process, and what will be done with it afterward remain unanswered. And that’s just for starters.

The Marcellus Shale has the potential to power the Northeast for a generation or more, and to turn the area’s last unspoiled landscapes into industrial wasteland. Royalties from gas drilling can fund our schools and social services and erase our crushing deficits, while creating water and air pollution from which we might never recover. It can divide neighbor from neighbor, upstate from downstate, while bringing an upstate revival that will allow aging families to remain in their homes and even bring young people back to the region. You pick.

At the Crossroads

These and many other concerns are addressed in a massive document that you can read online at http://www.dec.ny.gov/energy/75370. html (Please don’t print it out unless you really hate trees). It’s the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation’s answer to the Tolkien trilogy, entitled the Preliminary Revised Draft of the Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (GEIS).

The report suggests how New York state proposes to govern fracking in the Marcellus Shale, and it tweaks the earlier draft GEIS first released in 2009, responding to the more than 13,000 comments made on that tome. The new report is open for public comment from now through September.

Pressure from legislators has led to a moratorium on fracking that is set to expire this month, and politicians in both Central New York and New York City have persuaded the DEC to declare both the Skaneateles and the Catskill watersheds, which feed water to the Salt City and the Big Apple, respectively, offlimits. The federal Environmental Protection Agency is also conducting a review of the impact of fracking nationwide, and there is pressure in Albany to extend the moratorium until the EPA releases its findings, probably not for at least another year.

Public sentiment runs high against the procedure, even as local landowners continue to sign leases giving companies the right to drill on their land.

Bill Fischer, the bike-riding former cop, comes to us with his simple, fatalistic message. “They’re not gonna stop this industry,” he concedes. “In our area the grass-roots was building up, but the industry was rolling over everybody. There’s just too much money in it.”

In his case the gas company was allowed to drill in spite of his exhaustive organizing efforts. Fischer had banded together with neighbors to form a Silver Lake Watershed Legal Defense Fund. They petitioned the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to declare their watershed “exceptional” and entitled to special protection.

“They designated 52 acres along the Silver Creek as ‘exceptional quality,’ which means no surface water contamination would be allowed,” says Fischer. “We thought that ruled out hydrofracking because of the possibility of leaks contaminating the surface water—but there’s no enforcement.” They went to the Public Utility Commission and won a ruling denying Laser Marcellus Gathering Company, a gas company, the use of eminent domain to take control of land to build a pipeline, only to see the commission reverse the recommendation.

“We saw the handwriting on the wall,” he continues. “It was a risk to stay. Long before this my wife and I understood, based on policies coming out of Harrisburg, that industrial development was going to be allowed, and this {their home in Silver Lake} would no longer be the place we thought it would be. We put the house up for sale and found a buyer in three days.

“Anyone who says, ‘no way, no how, not here’ is not being realistic. It’s not about stopping it; it’s about guiding it in a responsible way. This will necessarily go through in both northern Pennsylvania and southern New York state. The difference will be the amount of profit that will go from the public to foreign corporations.

“Do we develop this for the benefit of the public or for a few people? This is a public resource: The public is entitled to the profits. Here’s a state that’s going bankrupt, and you’ve got a huge amount of wealth that’s being taken to Texas {where many of the drilling companies are located} for the asking. Rather than close schools and programs,” he offers, “use the tax revenue from this industry to revive the state.”

In His Opinion

So how do you make it work for the people? Fischer rattles off policy options covering everything from the macroeconomic level down to engineering basics.

• “Every time they put a hole in the ground in the Marcellus Shale they’re making money,” he says, referring to the oil companies. “There’s so much gas that there’s almost no risk, and the certainty of gas sucks capital out of the market for all renewable energy sources.”

• “Why risk your capital investing in solar or wind when there’s so much money to be made drilling for gas in the Marcellus Shale? The only thing that can change that is government policy.”

• “There are things that New York state can do. The gas industry uses public air, water and roads. You can say, ‘This is a public resource and it is to be used for public wealth, to be shared.’ Like they do in Saudi Arabia, like they did in Alaska. This is seen by some as too socialistic. So if you don’t like that, change the permitting process.”

• “Instead of setting a permit price by the depth of the well, put those permits up for auction. Let the market determine the value. And only issue the number of permits that you can supervise. How many wells can you supervise for three shifts a day, seven days a week? Gas companies drill 24/7; we can’t have inspectors who go home at 5 p.m.”

In addition, Fischer suggests that a meter be placed on every well to measure the amount of flowback fluid coming back up from the shale. Right now he worries that the lack of measurement of returning fluid gives unscrupulous companies an incentive to dump their toxic wastewater. If it were metered, the company would have to account for the disposal of each and every gallon. In addition, he suggests, add a chemical tag to each well so that any wastewater found dumped illegally could be traced back to the well operator. Better yet, he says, have the state take charge of all wastewater and process it—for a hefty fee.

While Fischer came here to get away from the hydrofracking controversy and to be closer to family—three of his four children live locally, as do two grandchildren—the struggle for the heart of gasland seems determined to follow him. At a community forum in Fabius in May he was introduced as a “refugee from hydrofracking”; more recently he was part of a delegation visiting state Sen. David Valesky (D-Oneida) to talk on the issue.

“The decision to sell our house wasn’t to come up here. Once we decided to move, this was the logical place to come. There were a lot of tears shed over this, and a lot of secondguessing. I will be second-guessing myself until I die.”

As for Central New York, he says that they are here for good. “We love it here. We’re staying.”

Gas companies, beware. There’s a cop on your tail.

         

Filed under Air Pollution, Community Impacts, Economics, Right vs Wrong, Water Tagged with , , , , ,

Newsvine – The Fracking Unknown

July 1, 2011

Newsvine – The Fracking Unknown.

The Fracking Unknown

Fri Jul 1, 2011 3:55 PM EDT
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By Donald McKinley Allen
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There are many things the citizens of New York State don’t know about the Fracking for NG (natural gas) which is about to over-run the south central part of NYS known as the Southern Tier. But there is one thing which we do know; Governor Andrew Cuomo doesn’t think he can be elected President of the United States in 2016 if he is opposed by Big Oil & Gas. So he is bowing to the power of Big O & G by lifting the current ban on Fracking. Cuomo must feel that the huge amount of money America’s biggest dollar industry will throw against him will defeat him as it did Al Gore in 2000; if he stands in the way of their Fracking in the Southern Tier of New York State.

In 2000 Big O & G took George W. Bush, an unimpressive Governor of Texas, who was considered a political light weight and pretty much of a joke; and made him POTUS with their hundreds of millions of dollars. They conveniently provided him with Vice-President Dick Cheney, formerly the head of Halliburton the country’s largest G & O service company. After Cheney’s secret meetings with O &G executives, with Cheney in charge of American energy policy, Big O & G had the Republican Congress pass the 2005 changes to Clean Air and Safe Drinking Water Acts; exempting the O & G industry from key section and severely limiting the EPA’s investigative and enforcement powers. About a year later they announced the High Volume Slick Water Hydraulic Fracturing technique commonly known as Fracking. Big O & G needed the 2005 exemptions because Fracking uses millions of gallons of water mix with Fracking fluid which contains dozens of toxic and carcinogenic chemicals. This Fracking fluid is injected in horizontal shafts running through the shale beds in order to crack open the rock and allow NG to be pumped out, along with some of the Fracking fluid. A lot of the Fracking fluid remains in the ground; where it can flows to anywhere. The drilled vertical shafts which connect up to a dozen or more horizontal shafts run up and through the drinking water aquifers above the shale beds. Any leak or accident in the vertical shafts can contaminate the aquifer with Fracking fluid or methane (NG) which they pass through. When and if this contamination is detected the cost and/or technology to clean the water could be beyond our abilities.

Big O & G then went on to Frack in Texas, Arkansas, Colorado, Wyoming, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. In each place they Fracked there have been serious environmental problems. The wide range of these problems include; contamination of drinking water by methane or Fracking fluid; earthquakes and earth movement caused by the voids created and/or waste Fracking fluid injected under extreme pressure; surface infrastructure destruction; air pollution; gas explosions and a long list of other dangerous environmental, safety and health incidents.

Now Big O & G have their eyes set on the Marcellus Shale Play that underlies NYS’s Southern Tier. NYS has had a moratorium in place for over two years while it has been trying to update its 20 year old Environmental Impact Study to accommodate what is becoming known about Fracking techniques and chemicals. Unfortunately Big O& G won’t disclose the chemicals used in Fracking fluid, claiming they are “proprietary information”, despite calls for disclosure from the Federal EPA. Absent the public knowing the contents of Fracking fluid, it is impossible to test water sources for the chemicals in advance of Fracking. This enables the Frackers to use their standard “they were there before” defense when toxins or NG components are discovered in water supplies. This not being able to know the details of the dangers is the catch 22 of Fracking.

Among the other many things NYS citizens don’t know are; if as required in new DEC Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Study or SGEIS, the Fracking companies will comply with any mandatory (but not public) discloser of ingredients in their Fracking fluid to the DEC or lie as they did to the EPA in Texas. For twenty years Big O & G falsely told the EPA they were not using and dumping diesel fuel (which was banned) as part of the Fracking process. But when they were finally caught they confessed they were using it, dumping it and lying about it. Instead of paying a fine and decease from continuing the illegal use and dumping; Big O & G has used their economic influence with some Congress members to try and have the use and dumping of diesel fuel allowed by proposing more increasingly lax Clean Air and Safe Drinking Water Acts exemptions.

Another thing New Yorkers don’t know is; why Fracking is absolutely banned in the watersheds of New York City and Syracuse, which also have the Marcellus beneath, while in the Southern Tier the Fracker will be able to drill O & G industry proposed 5 to 10 thousand wells? Are the men, women and children of the Southern Tier less valuable, important or blessed than those in NYC or Syracuse? Or are there just fewer voters and mostly Republicans to boot. By banning Fracking in some water supplies the DEC and Cuomo is acknowledging the danger that Fracking poses to the water supply. What are they saying by allowing it other water supplies; that they don’t care about the health, safe or well being of some citizens of NYS? And when the greed of Big O & G puts up more money; will the rights and property of the residents of Onondaga, Delaware, Sullivan and Ulster Counties and even NYC be offered as expendable for political or career reasons?

When the first SGEIS was released by the DEC about two years ago, it would have allowed the issuing of drilling permits under the 20 year old rules; despite the fact that the DEC had only 17 inspection personnel for the proposed 5 to 10 thousand wells. In a NYS which has twisted its budget into a pretzel, cutting or limiting in almost every area of public employment to try to make it balance; how realistic is the likelihood that the necessary number of the hundreds (or even thousands) of new inspectors and other personnel will be hired and trained in order to adequately monitor the activities at 5 to 10 thousand wells? When it come to an industry which is notorious for playing fast, loose and dirty for quick profits, having the appropriate investigation, enforcement and oversight structure in place and well funded is paramount; but NYS ability and motivation is this regard is unknown.

A reasoned consideration of all the unknowns about the consequences of allowing Fracking should have lead to Cuomo extending the moratorium, if not announcing an outright ban on Fracking until at least the Federal EPA completes its comprehensive investigation and report on the dangers of Fracking, which is currently underway. However it looks like Cuomo’s political plans are in conflict with his sworn duty to protect the people of NYS; and his political aspirations have overwhelmed his moral compass. Cuomo has abandoned the vast majority of New Yorkers and have left us to defend and protect ourselves from those who would destroy our communities and way of life.

Fortunately the final chapter(s) of the struggle of the people of NYS to stop the Frackers and their allies from having their way is still unknown. We still have the right to vote and that enables us to do what we need to keep Fracking from ruining NYS. We can find fellow citizens to vote for who will respect and serve the citizens of their communities. Who, as representatives of their constituency in the State Legislature, can put into effect a moratorium or ban on Fracking, at least until we all know the results of complete and comprehensive studies. We can also replace Cuomo as Governor with someone who is only beholding to the citizens of NYS and not out to curry favor with, get contributions from and do the bidding of the likes of Big O &G and Wall Street Gangs. After a well deserved defeat in his re-election campaign, because of his turning his back on the well being of his constituents; Cuomo’s prospect of achieving his goal of becoming POTUS will be appropriately about nil. The one thing the people all across New York need to know and do know is that; if there is the will, there is a way to protect and save ourselves and our state!

Filed under Right vs Wrong Tagged with , ,

Wenonah Hauter: MIT’s Fracking Report Backs Its Donors: Gas Companies

June 22, 2011

Wenonah Hauter: MIT’s Fracking Report Backs Its Donors: Gas Companies.

Filed under Right vs Wrong

Paul Ryan And His Family To Benefit From The $45 Billion In Subsidies For Big Oil In His Budget

June 22, 2011

Paul Ryan’s budget, which means austerity for most Americans, turns out to mean prosperity for Ryan and his family. That budget, which the GOP-led House adopted as its blueprint, slashes funding for everyone from seniors to the disabled to students while preserving $45 billion in tax breaks and subsidies for Big Oil over the next […]/p

via Paul Ryan And His Family To Benefit From The $45 Billion In Subsidies For Big Oil In His Budget.

Filed under Right vs Wrong

HYDROFRACKING IN THE MARCELLUS SHALE: THE LIABILITY AND INSURANCE COVERAGE IMPLICATIONS

April 19, 2011

PERRIN’S LEGAL WEBINAR SERIES: HYDROFRACKING IN THE MARCELLUS SHALE: THE LIABILITY AND INSURANCE COVERAGE IMPLICATIONS

Wednesday, April 20th, 2011
2:00 – 3:30 PM ET

Speakers:

Emily A. Collins, Assistant Clinical Professor of Law, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
Michael Conley, Esq., Offit Kurman, Philadelphia, PA
Michael J. Naughton, Esq., Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP, NJ
Carl J. Pernicone, Esq., Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP, New York, NY
Radisav D. Vidic, Ph.D., P.E., William Kepler Whiteford Professor of Environmental Engineering and Chairman of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Swanson School of Engineering, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburg, PA

Agenda Topics to be covered:

Overview & Background of Hydrofracking & the Marcellus Shale 
Categories of Plaintiffs 
Theories of Liability: Statutory
Theories of Liability
Defendants 
Insurance Coverage Issues

Registration

Cost: $129, unlimited listeners. Includes 1 CLE for 1 listener (Additional CLE credits $25 each).

CLE Credit: 1.5-2.0 CLE credits, depending on state requirements.

Applications are being made to all CLE states as requested by attendees.

Speaker Bios:

Emily A. Collins, Assistant Clinical Professor of Law, University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA

Emily Collins joined the Pitt Law Faculty in 2008 as a Clinical Assistant Professor and Supervising Attorney of the Environmental Law Clinic.   Professor Collins comes to Pitt Law from the Office of Public Interest Counsel of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, where she served as a state-employed public interest environmental attorney in the areas of water quality, water rights, air quality, solid waste disposal, low-level radioactive waste disposal, remediation, and wastewater rates.

Drawing on her public interest practice and education at the Pace Environmental Litigation Clinic and the Gallatin School of New York University, Professor Collins has designed an interdisciplinary clinic that teaches students to work effectively in cross-disciplinary teams that provide legal and technical assistance to groups and individuals with environmental and community health concerns in Western Pennsylvania.

Michael Conley, Esq., Offit Kurman
Philadelphia, PA

Mr. Conley is the Chair of the Firm’s new Insurance Recovery Group in its Philadelphia office and a Principal in the Labor & Employment and Litigation Department.

Mr. Conley’s broad legal experience includes insurance coverage litigation, labor and employment law and general litigation. He represents policyholders with claims against insurance companies. His insurance coverage law experience includes handling coverage actions on behalf of insureds relating to bad faith claims, defense obligations, law and ordinance exclusions, breach of health insurance contract, crime coverage, employment liability coverage and coverage for asbestos-related claims and environmental liability.

Mr. Conley’s commercial litigation experience includes representing clients in cases involving breach of contract, abuse of process, trademark infringement, unfair trade practices and collections. For companies facing labor and employment law claims, Mr. Conley has handled issues involving collective bargaining throughout the US with various unions; over 100 labor arbitrations; appearances before the NLRB; and successful defense of union certification elections.

Mr. Conley regularly counsels companies on a variety of business matters and his experience includes contract drafting and negotiations on behalf of US-based clients for work in US, Europe, Middle East, South America and India; business acquisitions; ICC Arbitrations in Europe; environmental law issues; business formation; and MSHA and OSHA matters.

Michael J. Naughton, Esq., Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP
New Jersey

Michael J. Naughton is a Partner in the New Jersey office and the chair of the firm’s Environmental & Energy Regulatory & Compliance Group. He has represented clients in hundreds of environmental regulatory and permitting matters involving federal and state environmental laws and regulations throughout the United States.

Michael has been representing corporations and individual clients in real estate transactions, environmental litigation and regulatory compliance matters for more than 27 years. He has litigated numerous environmental cases involving various claims, including natural resource damage claims throughout the United States. Michael maintains a national CERCLA practice and routinely appears before the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, New Jersey Office of Administrative Law and the New York Department of Environmental Conservation.

In addition, Michael also advises clients in brownfield cleanups and redevelopment of contaminated properties. This part of his legal practice focuses on matters of due diligence and contractual allocation of environmental risks in transactions, disclosure laws and obligations concerning environmental conditions on real property, securing environmental insurance products to protect the firm’s clients against cleanup cost overruns and pollution legal liability, permit requirements under state and federal regulatory laws.

He also has experience in the handling of energy and infrastructure projects, climate change and sustainability matters. Michael has the ability to represent clients engaged in or considering business ventures in emerging green energy fields such as solar, wind, geothermal, cogeneration, biofuels and biomass. He also has experience in many aspects of energy management. He interfaces with consultants involved in energy efficiency analysis, energy master planning, and procurement of energy and alternative energy sources. Also, as a sub-set of the firm’s environmental permitting services, he assists consultants and engineers in the performance evaluations of a facility’s greenhouse gas (GHG) profile.

Michael has been appointed as a Special Environmental Mediator for the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey. He has also served as a Director of the Environmental Law Section for the New Jersey State Bar. Michael is a frequent lecturer and has written extensively on environmental law and regulatory issues.

Carl J. Pernicone, Esq., Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP
New York, NY

Carl J. Pernicone is a Partner in the New York office and is a co-founder and Co-Chair of the firm’s Insurance Practice Team.  Carl focuses his practice in the area of insurance and reinsurance coverage issues arising in complex, high exposure matters.

Much of Carl’s work concentrates on coverage disputes arising from so-called “long-tail injury” claims―such as those involving asbestos, lead, silica, workplace chemical exposure, and environmental liability.  More recently, he has become involved in addressing the coverage implications in the emerging area of Climate Change liability.

For more than two decades, Carl has represented insurers across the country as counsel of record in complex, high exposure suits in state and federal courts. In addition, he has extensive experience in analyzing coverage; issuing coverage opinions; preparing reservation of rights and disclaimer letters; drafting policy wording; and drafting insurance coverage settlement agreements policy “buyback” agreements. Carl also regularly lectures and writes on topical coverage decisions and emerging coverage issues. In addition, he manages the firm’s National Attorney Training program and chairs its Associate Professional Training and Development Committee.

Carl has been named to SuperLawyers’ Magazine’s 2009 and 2010 lists of the top Insurance Practices attorneys in the Metro New York area.

Radisav D. Vidic, Ph.D., P.E., William Kepler Whiteford Professor of Environmental Engineering and Chairman of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Swanson School of Engineering, University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburg, PA

Dr. Vidic holds a BS in Civil Engineering from the University of Belgrade (1987) and received his graduate education in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois (M.S., 1989) and University of Cincinnati (Ph.D., 1992). His research efforts focus on advancing the applications of surface science by providing fundamental understanding of molecular-level interactions at interfaces, development of novel physical/chemical water treatment technologies, water management for Marcellus shale development, and reuse of impaired waters for cooling systems in coal-fired power plants. Dr. Vidic published over 150 journal papers and conference proceedings on these topics. He received 2000 Professional Research Award from the Pennsylvania Water Environment Federation for his research accomplishments and dedication to the profession, was a Fulbright Scholar in 2003/04 and a was elected by the Pittsburgh section of American Society of Civil Engineers as 2008 Professor of the Year. In February 2011, he was selected by the Pittsburgh Post Gazette as one of the top 10 people shaping the Marcellus shale debate in Pennsylvania.

Filed under Accidents, Right vs Wrong Tagged with , ,

Natural Gas Industry Rhetoric Versus Reality-Brendan DeMelle

February 27, 2011

Brendan DeMelle | Natural Gas Industry Rhetoric Versus Reality.

25 February 11

Natural Gas Industry Rhetoric Versus Reality

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As the recent natural gas industry attacks on the Oscar-nominated documentary Gasland demonstrate, the gas industry is mounting a powerful PR assault against journalists, academics and anyone else who speaks out against the dangers of hydraulic fracturing and other threats to public health and the environment from shale gas development. DeSmogBlog has analyzed some of the common talking points the industry and gas proponents use to try to convince the public and lawmakers that fracking is safe despite real concerns raised by residents living near gas drilling sites, whose experiences reveal a much more controversial situation.

DeSmogBlog extensively reviewed government, academic, industry and public health reports and interviewed the leading hydraulic fracturing experts who challenge the industry claims that hydraulic fracturing does not contaminate drinking water, that the industrial fracking fluids pose no human health risk, that states adequately regulate the industry and that natural gas has a lighter carbon footprint than other fossil fuels like oil and coal.

Below are ten of the most commonly repeated claims by the industry about the ‘safety’ of hydraulic fracturing and unconventional natural gas development, along with extensive evidence showing their claims are pure rhetoric, and not reality.
Natural Gas Rhetoric Vs. Reality

1.    RHETORIC: There has never been a proven instance of drinking water contamination caused by hydraulic fracturing.

REALITY: This statement, repeatedly used by industry and pro-drilling groups, is highly misleading.

There is no doubt that water contamination has resulted from natural gas drilling practices. The actual cause of contamination can vary from case to case, and it is often difficult to conclusively determine the exact cause. Therefore, no natural gas drilling practice, including hydraulic fracturing, can be ruled out categorically.

This is an example of a typical PR trick, where industry uses highly specific language to deliberately mislead the public and to discredit the citizens whose drinking water has been ruined by contamination.
By crafting its argument around hydraulic fracturing specifically and not natural gas drilling more generally, industry is hiding behind technicalities to obscure its documented role in contaminating drinking water supplies.  It is referring only to a precise moment that occurs within a much larger industrial process.

Attributing groundwater contamination to the specific moment of hydraulic fracture is difficult to conclusively ‘prove’ because the process occurs thousands of feet underground, where it is difficult to track the exact migration of the chemicals and gasses involved.

The Houston Chronicle has noted industry’s use of this tactic, reporting that, “industry officials say few such incidents have been tied conclusively to hydraulic fracturing and that they are more likely isolated accidents involving other parts of drilling operations.” [emphasis added]

In fact, natural gas operations, especially hydraulic fracturing projects in unconventional gas deposits, have been linked to numerous instances of water contamination. For example, the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission confirmed that natural gas drilling directly caused the methane contamination of drinking water in Colorado, but could not definitively confirm the contamination was the direct result of hydraulic fracturing.

There are numerous aspects of drilling which may contribute to drinking water contamination, including spills, accidents, well blowouts, faulty cement jobs, and the improper transport, processing and storage of wastewater and drilling muds. Hydraulic fracturing in unconventional gas deposits requires vast amounts of water, and entails intensive drilling methods, and high-pressure injections – risky processes that increase the probability of accidents that could affect water supplies.

For numerous examples of water contamination related to natural gas drilling see reports from the Environmental Protection Agency, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Environmental Working Group, ProPublica, Earthworks Oil and Gas Accountability Project, the Arkansas Public Policy Panel, and the New York Riverkeeper.

2.    RHETORIC: Hydraulic fracturing is a proven method successfully applied in millions of gas wells for over 60 years.

REALITY: Again, this assertion leaves a false impression that industry has used the same fracking technique for six decades, when in fact the current hydraulic fracturing practices used in unconventional gas recovery have evolved greatly from the original methods employed 60 years ago. The reality is that the industry has less than ten years’ experience with high-volume slick water hydraulic fracturing.

According to recent testimony by Dr. Anthony Ingraffea, a hydraulic fracturing expert from Cornell University, the current fracturing technology is “surprisingly, relatively new. There are four elements of that new technology, and they did not come together in the United States until about eight years ago. So this is not the hydraulic fracturing of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. It’s not conventional gas development of that era. It’s a relatively new combined technology. … When industry says that they’ve had vast experience, 60 years of experience, with hydraulic fracturing, what they fail to say is that they’ve had fewer than 10 years of experience on a large scale using these unconventional methods to develop gas from shale.” [emphasis added]

The scope and scale of modern hydraulic fracturing operations in unconventional plays are much greater than the way the technology was used decades ago.

These drastic differences include:

•    Significantly higher amounts of water (and water pressure) used in each fracture, up to 7.8 million gallons per well. This represents 50 to 100 times the amount needed in conventional gas wells. Each well is capable of being fractured multiple times, in some cases, as many as 20 times. Post extraction procedures, such as refining and transport, can use an additional 400 million gallons of water each day.
•    Horizontal drilling is employed in about 90% of unconventional gas wells in the U.S. Horizontal drilling techniques allow lateral access to deposits thousands of feet underground. This recent technological advancement is what has made harvesting unconventional deposits profitable, and accounts for the increase in drilling pressure, up to 13,500 psi.
•   The chemical components of fracturing fluids are constantly evolving and research has shown a number of them to be extremely toxic to human and environmental health. Given the high volumes of water necessary for each fracture job, enormous amounts of chemicals are required, up to 20 tons per 1 million gallons of water used.
3.    RHETORIC: The water contamination featured in Gasland and investigated by journalists from ProPublica are instances of preexisting methane contamination from other sources. Hydraulic fracturing for natural gas occurs thousands of feet below water bearing aquifers and could not possibly be their source of contamination.

REALITY: The natural gas industry commonly raises this point to delegitimize concerns of water contamination due to drilling operations. Without baseline testing prior to the commencement of drilling – a critical protection not yet mandatory in any state – industry can continue to claim that contaminants subsequently identified in nearby water wells are “naturally occurring.”

Drilling operations can enable methane to contaminate water through “disturbances of previously blocked migration paths through joint sets or faults, or by puncturing pressurized biogenic gas pockets and allowing migration through an as-yet un-cemented annulus, or through a faulty cement job.” Faulty cement jobs can allow natural gas, fracturing fluids and contaminated flowback water to travel alongside the wellbore to nearby drinking water aquifers.

EPA scientists confirmed methane and other contaminants were responsible in a Fort Worth, Texas water contamination incident linked to gas drilling operations. Based on contamination incidents in Garfield County, a report by hydrogeologist Geoffrey Thyne gives an account of how methane migration can and has occurred.

The presence of methane in drinking water is a serious danger.  Methane will evaporate quickly from drinking water and is explosive when trapped in confined structures such as homes. Immediate effects of inhalation are dizziness and headaches. At high enough levels methane can act as an asphyxiant causing suffocation by displacing available oxygen. Instances of oxygen depravity can lead to hypoxia, where there is a lack of oxygen to sustain life, and can lead to nausea, brain damage and eventually death.

The presence of methane does not account for the issue of toxic chemicals from fracturing fluids in drinking water. Baseline testing, which is not yet mandatory in any state, would establish the quality of drinking water before drilling and would prevent operators from falsely claiming that ‘contamination occurred prior to drilling’ in instances where that is not the case.

4.    RHETORIC: The natural gas industry and its use of hydraulic fracturing are – and have always been – “aggressively regulated” by the states.

REALITY: State public health and safety agencies have failed to keep pace with the industry’s aggressive experimentation with new drilling technologies and the rapid expansion of unconventional gas development.

Existing standards and protections for public health and the environment vary widely from state to state, and have not been reconciled with the rapidly evolving technology. According to Earthworks, reporting requirements are often scant in gas producing states, and companies do not have to report detailed information on drilling chemicals, the amount of fluids remaining in the ground after injection, or whether fractures remain within targeted areas. In some states, companies do not have to monitor water quality when drilling near sources of drinking water.

An Environmental Working Group report describes state officials as largely ‘oblivious’ to what companies are injecting into the ground during hydraulic fracturing operations and at times appearing to misinterpret the Safe Drinking Water Act, particularly concerning the use of diesel.

In fact, a recent congressional investigation into the illegal use of diesel in hydraulic fracturing operations found that state agencies had little knowledge that companies were using diesel without permits (and in violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act). Between 2005 and 2009, over 32 million gallons of diesel and fracturing fluids containing diesel were used illegally in hydraulic fracturing operations, according to the investigation.

In 2010, the State Review of Oil and Natural Gas Environmental Regulations (STRONGER) demonstrated that:
•    baseline testing is not always mandatory prior to drilling activities;
•    cement job logs are not always maintained by operators;
•    potential underground migration pathways which could act as a conduit for fluid migration into groundwater, such as abandoned wells, do not have to be identified before drilling in all states;
•    the depth of surface casings when drilling near groundwater do not have to be included in drilling permit applications to ensure groundwater protection;
•    not all states have adequately addressed how information on fracturing chemicals will be made available to medical responders in the event of an emergency;
•    not all operators are required to notify state officials when drilling operations will commence;
•    waste storage and pits do not always undergo inspection or certification.

EPA investigations have faulted state officials for inadequate response to concerns over drinking water contamination due to gas drilling. Public health and safety protections, whether state or federal, are only truly effective with comprehensive monitoring and enforcement before, during, and after drilling operations.

The Council of Scientific Society Presidents has also warned that natural gas derived from hydrofracking shales is “another area where policy has preceeded adequate scientific study.”

A geological engineering expert interviewed by DeSmogBlog cautioned that “it is important to make sure that regulatory agencies can do their jobs independently and are not ‘captured’ by industry or placed under undue political pressure by our elected representatives.”

5.    RHETORIC: Hydraulic fracturing has not been made exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act because it was never regulated under it in the first place.

REALITY: Energy In Depth’s suggestion that hydraulic fracturing has not been made exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act is erroneous. The exemption of hydraulic fracturing from EPA authority via the “Halliburton Loophole” in the 2005 energy bill is well documented.

The Safe Drinking Water Act has always covered the “subsurface emplacement of fluid” within the Underground Injection Control (UIC) program in order to protect underground sources of drinking water (USDWs). UIC included the processes associated with hydraulic fracturing until language was inserted into the 2005 Energy Policy Act in order to alter the definition of underground injection to mean “the subsurface emplacement of fluids by well injection” but to exclude “the underground injection of fluids or propping agents (other than diesel fuels) pursuant to hydraulic fracturing operations related to oil, gas, or geothermal production activities.”

The Center for American Progress released a report in 2004 accusing the Bush Administration of “altering scientific information to advance an oil and gas development practice known as ‘hydraulic fracturing.’” The report, entitled “Special Interest Takeover: The Bush Administration and the Dismantling of Public Safeguards,” details how in 2002 the EPA briefed congressional staff about the dangers of hydraulic fracturing, especially concerning benzene contamination in drinking water. The EPA, however, soon revised their position, saying fracturing would not contaminate drinking water with levels of benzene above federal standards.  EPA claimed the change in position was due to information from an ‘industry source.’ As a result, Cheney’s Energy Task Force removed any mention of these concerns from its energy plan.

The oil and gas industry also enjoys numerous other exemptions from federal oversight including the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA or Superfund Act), the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, the Toxic Release Inventory and the National Environmental Policy Act.

6.    RHETORIC: The chemicals used in the fracturing process are as common as household cleaning products, cosmetics and processed food ingredients. Companies are voluntarily reporting fracturing chemicals on their websites so the legal disclosure required by the FRAC Act is unnecessary.

REALITY: While natural gas companies have begun to ‘voluntarily’ report some chemicals used in fracturing on their websites, there is a lack of complete disclosure, which leaves the public and health officials in the dark about the potential health risks involved.

These website “fact sheets” do not reveal all of the chemicals used in the fracturing process, nor do they include Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) identifier numbers which are necessary to identify the toxicity of each chemical component.

Industry only “volunteered” the partial information in an effort to deter the legally binding disclosure proposed in the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act (FRAC Act), a measure introduced in 2009 that stalled in congressional committee after intense industry lobbying.

The lack of information regarding the chemicals used in the drilling process seriously inhibits the efficacy of contamination investigations because investigators do not know what to test for. In addition, these “fact sheets” often present the few disclosed chemicals in misleading ways, suggesting them as harmless household products, or even as ice cream ingredients.

Some of the chemicals used in the hydraulic fracturing process are known to cause cancer and organ damage, and to be disruptive to reproductive, neurological and endocrine systems.

A recent investigation revealed the unpermitted injection of more than 32 million gallons of diesel for hydraulic fracturing by numerous natural gas operators between 2004 and 2009. The use of diesel, which contains benzene (a known carcinogen), in hydraulic fracturing is illegal and in direct violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act. A report by the Environmental Working Group identifies other unregulated petroleum distillates used in hydraulic fracturing which resemble diesel that were found to have 93 times more benzene than diesel.

7.    RHETORIC: The majority of fracture fluids remain underground in the hydraulic fracturing process.

REALITY: Again, this is industry “spin” that fails to account for widespread uncertainty about the true fate of these industrial fluids.

According to Dr. Anthony Ingraffea, “The industry is fond of saying that most of what they pump down stays down. What they fail to talk about is the timeframe in which they’re counting. Typically, the returned fluid, after the fracturing process, is counted as returned fracturing fluid only during about the first week or two of flowback operations. However, all shale gas wells continue to produce fracturing fluid and brine containing heavy metals for the entire life of the well. One has to be very careful. One cannot say that on average, 50% of the fluid comes back. One has to say under what timeframe one is making that measurement. Typically, almost all of the fracturing fluid comes back during the life of the well.”

The returned fluid, once resurfaced, poses unique risks: “once the fluid comes back…it contains not only the chemicals that were put in on the way down but the material that was picked up from the shale…notably, in black shales, shales containing gas, the most dangerous of those are the heavy metals – strontium, barium, uranium, and radium – some of which are also naturally occurring radioactive materials.”

Dr. Theo Colborn of The Endocrine Disruption Exchange (TEDX) reports that once drilling is complete, produced water continues to surface for the life of the well for 20 to 30 years.

A 2009 Department of Energy report suggested that between 30 and 70 percent of fracking fluids remain underground, however the DOE noted the uncertainty of determining the exact fate of the fluids: “it is not possible to unequivocally state that 100% of the fracturing fluids have been recovered or to differentiate flow back water from natural formation water.”

8.    RHETORIC: In 2004 the EPA’s study on hydraulic fracturing concluded that the process posed no real threat to drinking water. The current EPA studies, the first regarding human health and drinking water due in 2012 and the second considering the lifecycle of natural gas drilling operations due in 2014, are redundant.

REALITY: The 2004 EPA study has been widely discredited by scientists and independent experts (and EPA’s own scientists) for failing to test water in contaminated areas.  The study’s objectivity was compromised by direct industry pressure throughout the course of the study, presenting a clear conflict of interest.

In 2000, the EPA began a study to determine the risks posed to drinking water by hydraulic fracturing.  This controversial study, completed in 2004, concluded that hydraulic fracturing in coalbed methane “poses little or no threat to drinking water.” This study was largely used to justify the “Halliburton Loophole” exemption and is still currently cited by the gas industry to assert the safety of hydraulic fracturing and to deny allegations of water contamination.

The study has since been discredited after widespread criticism from independent exerts, as well as internal criticism among EPA scientists who noted the faulty study neglected to test water samples in contaminated areas. Both EPA and independent experts noted the study was compromised due to the involvement of industry groups who were consulted throughout the process, posing a clear conflict of interest.

The study was also extremely limited in scope, focusing solely on coalbed methane fracturing and the potential for the underground migration of chemicals through rock layers. After the report was released, EPA scientist Weston Wilson cautioned Colorado representatives that “based on available science and literature, EPA’s conclusions are unsupportable.”

In late 2009, the EPA was congressionally mandated to launch a new investigation into hydraulic fracturing. In March 2010, the EPA announced that the report was to address more extensively the threats posed by hydraulic fracturing to drinking water and human health.

In June 2010, the EPA Science Advisory Board endorsed additional research into the lifecycle of hydraulic fracturing and the potential impacts on drinking water.  This study will include a focused review of the potential impacts on drinking water, ten in-depth case studies conducted across the U.S., and will include stakeholder participation throughout the research. The proposed research includes an increased scope of study including water acquisition, frac fluid mixing, hydraulic fracturing, post-fracturing, and flowback and wastewater management. The initial results of the study are due in 2012 and the full report is due in 2014.

9.    RHETORIC: Natural gas has a lighter carbon footprint than other fossil fuels such as oil or coal.

REALITY: Although gas burns cleaner than coal and oil, the extraction, the processing and transport of natural gas emit large amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas (GHG). Methane has a global warming potential 21 times greater than carbon dioxide on a 100-year scale, and 72 times greater than carbon dioxide on a 20-year scale. A recent, ongoing Cornell analysis suggests the footprint of shale gas may be 1.2 to 2.1-fold greater than coal’s on a 20-year timeframe.

Recently the EPA drastically increased estimates of methane leakage from the natural gas industry.  The revised figures estimate emissions from unconventional natural gas operations at 9,000 times higher than previous estimates. Yet, due to inadequate data regarding unconventional natural gas extraction from resources such as shale gas, the EPA maintains that these revised figures likely underestimate the total amounts.

Professor Robert Howarth and colleagues from Cornell University, using EPA estimates of methane leakage from natural gas operations, puts natural gas ahead of coal in terms of GHG emissions. The EPA recently estimated that fugitive methane from the petroleum and natural gas sector equals the annual equivalent of 40 million passenger cars.

10.     RHETORIC: In some states like Pennsylvania, much of the wastewater from hydraulic fracturing is recycled. Where wastewater is not recycled, it is safely injected into underground wells.

REALITY: Wastewater recycling in the U.S. is still in its infancy, and has been plagued with problems. A Halliburton manager Ron Hyden put it succinctly in a newspaper interview: “We’re still in the infancy of trying to figure out how to recycle the water.”

Standards for “recycling” wastewater vary according to operations and in some states recycling is not practiced at all. Recycling of wastewater usually involves either the reuse of flowback water for additional hydraulic fracturing operations, or treatment where water is separated from contaminants. In the latter case, the remainder is a highly concentrated mixture of hazardous chemicals, salts and in some cases, radioactive materials, which must be disposed of properly.

The reuse of flowback water in hydraulic fracturing operations poses a threat to underground sources of drinking water, in much the same way that injection of waste fluids in disposal wells poses such a threat and is therefore regulated by EPA under the Safe Drinking Water Act (UIC program). In Ohio, for example, wastewater cannot be reinjected for use in hydraulic fracturing due to water contamination concerns.

There are public health concerns that disposal by means of underground injection will result in “creating yet another potential source of extremely toxic chemical contamination.” Some states require companies to demonstrate that the disposal injection will not escape target zones or contaminate fresh water aquifers (e.g. New York).

A recent report by the Arkansas Public Policy Panel notes that the underground injection of waste can threaten drinking water sources through:
•    the injection of waste above aquifers;
•    leakage between unconfined beds;
•    leakage due to hydraulic fracturing or faults;
•    upward migration of waste along well casings;
•    migration due to cement failures;
•    migration through preexisting pathways such as abandoned wells;
•    migration due to injection pressures or geologic shifts.

Geologists suspect that a recent scourge of earthquakes in Guy, Arkansas may be connected to underground injection of fracking wastewater for disposal.

—
Additional research and reporting by DeSmogBlog contributors Carol Linnitt and Emma Pullman.
Stay tuned for more of DeSmogBlog’s research on fracking and gas industry distortions.

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Libous pushes N.Y. role for gas-drilling industry | Press & Sun-Bulletin | pressconnects.com

February 23, 2011

Libous pushes N.Y. role for gas-drilling industry | Press & Sun-Bulletin | pressconnects.com. Feb. 18, 2011

BINGHAMTON — Sen. Thomas W. Libous has seen the region’s economic future: Drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus Shale.

The era when Broome County could lure significant economic development to the region from other states is over, the senator told members of the Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce on Thursday during a chamber-sponsored legislative dialogue with state elected officials.

“This is an opportunity,” Libous said of drilling in the Marcellus Shale, a portion of which lies beneath Broome County. “Let’s not blow it.”

Libous, along with Assemblywoman Donna A. Lupardo, D-Endwell, and Assemblyman Clifford Crouch, R-Guilford, were quizzed Thursday on a variety of topics, including a state-proposed 2 percent property tax cap, pension reform and a proposal from Gov. Andrew Cuomo to create statewide Economic Development Councils.

Libous, a Binghamton Republican who is also deputy majority leader in the Senate, said about 88,000 jobs connected with gas drilling have been created so far in Pennsylvania. Libous said he recently spoke to a trucker from Texas who he met by chance at Greater Binghamton Airport.

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Growing in Power, Natural Gas Attracts Enemies – NYTimes.com

February 21, 2011

Growing in Power, Natural Gas Attracts Enemies – NYTimes.com.

By ANNE C. MULKERN of Greenwire
Published: February 16, 2011
Green

A blog about energy and the environment.

As the fuel grows in market share and political power, several green groups have launched campaigns highlighting potential problems. They raise questions about everything from how natural gas is extracted to how much of a climate benefit it offers over competitors.

“Natural gas, especially newly available unconventional gas, has the potential to dramatically shift the energy landscape in the U.S.,” said Matt Watson, senior energy policy manager at Environmental Defense Fund. “Done right, it could be an important part of de-carbonizing our economy as we ramp up on truly clean energy resources. Done wrong, it could further entrench us on the losing side of the climate equation and do very real damage.”

The efforts build on the buzz of Oscar-nominated “Gasland,” an anti-drilling documentary. The natural gas industry, which calls many aspects of that movie erroneous, argues that the concerns of environmental groups are misplaced.

“We are proud of the extraordinary role that natural gas can play in power generation, transportation and manufacturing to advance cleaner air and improve U.S. energy security,” said Dan Whitten, spokesman for America’s Natural Gas Alliance, the trade group for independent companies. “Our members are committed to the safe and responsible development of this resource.”

Natural gas is surging in use, pushed by record low prices for the fuel.

In 2010, natural gas constituted 24 percent of power generation, from 13 percent in 1996, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).

EIA projects that by 2024, natural gas will drop back slightly to 21 percent because of growth in renewable power and because the price of natural gas will start to rise, making coal more competitive.

But it could be buoyed by Congress. Some are talking about including the fuel in a clean energy standard, a requirement that utilities generate a portion of their power from less polluting sources.

President Obama in his State of the Union address said he wanted the country to use 80 percent clean power by 2035. In addition to renewable sources, the White House has mentioned meeting that goal with nuclear power, coal with carbon sequestration and some natural gas.

Groups like the Sierra Club have watched that growth and natural gas’s growing clout, and decided that they needed to seek more federal oversight.

“It became very evident that this was a huge, looming problem and we needed to get it right,” said Bruce Hamilton, director of the Sierra Club’s Global Warming and Energy Program. “We don’t just want to open the floodgates [and] at the same time not address the very, very serious impacts that natural gas has on the human and the natural environments.”

The Sierra Club argues that drilling for the fuel can lead to groundwater contamination and problems with leaks into homes. Natural gas drillers, the green group said, enjoy exemptions from parts of several environmental rules.

The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) contends that there are doubts about the widely held belief that natural gas emits half the greenhouse gases of coal.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, meanwhile, is filing lawsuits against developers it believes have violated federal law. NRDC also is also lobbying for beefed-up regulation of the hydraulic fracturing technique used in some drilling.

On Thursday, the cause gets help from Hollywood. NRDC and Environmental Working Group will join “Gasland” director Josh Fox in lobbying lawmakers on the need for more drilling regulation. Mark Ruffalo, an Oscar-nominated actor, also will attend. Ruffalo lives in New York and Fox part-time in Pennsylvania in towns affected by shale gas development.

The natural gas industry said it has plenty of regulation.

“Natural gas is routinely produced safely in communities across the country,” Whitten said. “This is due to the commitment of our industry to responsible development, and credit also is due to the vigilant oversight of state regulators.

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