DEC flooded with hydrofracking responses: Comment period closes next week

ALBANY — The responses came from Buffalo to Albany, from Plattsburgh to Long Island, from states as far away as Nevada.

Everyone from college students to senior citizens sent them in, even a child the age of 6. They were written online and by hand, from elected officials to everyday citizens and business owners.

They are the 18,100 comments the state has received so far on its study of hydraulic fracturing for natural gas, with each submission manually logged by Department of Environmental Conservation staff.

A review by Gannett’s Albany Bureau of the public comments submitted through Dec. 16, obtained through a Freedom of Information Law request, shows interest from all corners of the state. Submissions from those against hydrofracking appeared to outnumber those from supporters by at least a 10-to-1 margin.

And with the comment period set to close Wednesday, advocates on both sides of the contentious gas-drilling debate say they’re set to flood the DEC with thousands more.

“We’ve got over 10,000 individual sheets that are signed by landowners that we’re going to bring up (to Albany) with our actual comments on (Tuesday),” said Dan Fitzsimmons, of Conklin, Broome County, and president of the Joint Landowners Coalition, a pro-drilling group.

The submissions were in response to 1,500 pages of guidelines and recommendations proposed by the DEC in September on how to mitigate the impacts of hydrofracking. The technique uses large volumes of water mixed with sand and chemicals to break open underground shale formations and unlock natural gas.

A four-month comment period kicked off the same day the document was released, with four public hearings across the state attracting 6,000 attendees, with 590 people testifying in person.

The vast majority of comments were submitted electronically or mailed to the DEC’s Albany office. Some were written by individuals acting on their own, others were part of letter-writing campaigns organized by advocacy groups in all regions of the state.

Energy Citizens, a group funded by the American Petroleum Institute, generated hundreds of responses through its website. The group mailed a form letter to the DEC on someone’s behalf when that person provided his or her name and address on the Energy Citizens website.

One group, Brooklyn-based Frack Action, even held a handful of “comment writing parties” in various parts of the state, gathering people together to jot down their concerns and mailing them en masse.

Others organized door-to-door efforts and phone banks.

“I wrote my letter very, very quickly because a young man had stopped by and was handing out literature on hydrofracking,” said Karen Lambdin, a 53-year-old Pelham Manor, Westchester County, mother of four who wrote her two-page submission in perfect cursive on a small piece of blank paper.

The comments highlight the crux of the four-year debate.

Environmental and anti-fracking groups point to contaminated water supplies in Dimock, Pa., and Pavilion, Wyo., where governmental agencies have determined drilling led to contaminated water supplies. Drilling supporters look to the rural Pennsylvania economy, which is on the upswing due to hydrofracking and gas drilling.

But the decision on whether to allow hydrofracking in New York shouldn’t be based on who submits more paper to the DEC, said Mike Elmendorf, a founding member of the Clean Growth Now coalition, a pro-drilling group.

“This isn’t a decision that should be made based on who has more time on their hands,” Elmendorf said. “We’ve heard a lot from the other side, but this is something that can put New Yorkers back to work and provide a boost to the economy, especially in the Southern Tier.”

The database of comments speaks to the variety of responders, both when it comes to geography and demographics.

Jean-Luc Gibson, of New York City, scribbled his response in kid-like manuscript on a piece of scrap paper.

He has an excuse: he’s 6 years old.

“Please stop fracking!” he wrote in a mix of capital and lower-case letters, all with varying degrees of legibility. “We need clean water!”

There were thousands of comments both from within the Marcellus Shale — a gas-rich underground formation that spans the Southern Tier and is targeted by energy companies — and from outside the region.

James Dye, a 71-year-old retired engineer from Walworth, Wayne County, said living outside of the Marcellus isn’t reason to be uninformed. Wayne County does not sit above the Marcellus, but it does sit above the Utica Shale, which gas companies are exploring in Ohio.

“I’m concerned for our country, the whole area,” Dye said in an interview. “I just don’t think (hydrofracking) is a good idea.”

Other major governmental entities and advocacy groups said they would submit their comments Tuesday or Wednesday, ahead of the Jan. 11 deadline.

That includes the Independent Oil & Gas Association, which is expected to criticize the proposed rules as cost prohibitive and overbearing; and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which was highly critical of the protections included in a 2009 draft of the DEC’s report.

But as the comment count grows, so does the work for the DEC.

With high-volume hydrofracking on hold until its study is finalized, the agency is in the process of grouping submissions with common themes.

After that, it will have to respond to each issue raised — both in the comments received in the current draft and in the 13,000 comments that were submitted on a 2009 draft — in a “responsiveness summary” included in its final draft.

Speaking to reporters last month, DEC Commissioner Joe Martens was asked when the report might be finished. He’s asked that question every time he speaks, Martens noted, “and every time I get asked, the number of comments grows.

“It will take months, so I can’t say whether it’s going to be three months, four months, five months,” Martens said. “But it will take months to do it properly and make sure we have a document at the end of the day that is truly responsive to the input we’ve gotten from the public.”

The sheer amount of comments is encouraging on one level, said Jill Bressler, 44, who works in the advertising industry and lives in Kerhonkson, Ulster County. Out of the 18,100 comments, Bressler’s was the third to be submitted to the DEC, according to the agency’s records.

Whether or not the state takes the letters seriously remains to be seen, she said. She opposes hydrofracking.

“I guess I’m afraid that the governor won’t care,” Bressler said. “The comments, I don’t know how much weight they hold. It makes me really scared.”