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ONLY ONE
CHANCE TO GET THIS RIGHT!
Why we need a moratorium on Marcellus Shale gas drilling
Jerry Lee Miller
On April
5th, I attended the Community Breakfast hosted by State Senator Lloyd
Smucker at Calvary Fellowship Homes in Manheim Township. When a
question regarding the Marcellus Shale gas drilling arose, Senator
Smucker stated his belief that we need an extraction tax in place. "We
only have one chance to get this right!" he proclaimed.
While the
senator's words were stated in the context of economics, I believe
they are even more potent if applied to the health, safety and
environmental questions surrounding Marcellus Shale drilling. When it
comes to the protection of our water wells, rivers and underground
aquifers as well as to our state lands and to all the natural
resources, which comprise our commonwealth; "We only have one chance
to get this right!"
Economics
is more than jobs and more than an inflow of dollars into businesses,
into landowners' pockets and into the coffers of government at all
levels. Economics also includes the cost we pay when we sacrifice
fragile and finite living assets like health, water, forests and land
for short-term benefits. Even 50 to 100 years of financial benefit is
very little compared to those things.
For a
current cautionary tale, consider the multi-leveled tragedies in
Japan. Consider the dislocated and disoriented population in Japan's
northeast plus the millions more throughout the nation who now endure
the rolling blackouts and now must question the safety of their food,
air and water; and now face a likely reduction of future living
standard because their national resources will be channeled into
massive rebuilding efforts over a very long recovery period. How many
of these suffering people would vote for a moratorium on the building
of nuclear power plants in tsunami threatened areas if they could go
back in time 30 years?
But they
had their one chance to get it right and now must make the best of a
horror story.
I don't
suppose the potential consequences of fracking pose the same level of
danger as nuclear meltdowns. But who really knows? We are already
hearing many sad stories coming out of the Marcellus Shale regions,
including the threat of radioactivity in our drinking water. Many
Pennsylvanians believe the $3 million in political contributions to
Pennsylvania lawmakers by the drilling industry since 2001 (about 30%
of which went to our current governor) and the $5 million they've
spent on lobbying since 2006 has swung the gates open wide for the
drills, trucks and fracking water to come pouring into our
commonwealth.
"When
asked to put in place a temporary moratorium on drilling in public
lands until a full study of the impact could be made, those who voted
“no” had accepted an average of three times as much cash from gas
interests than those who supported that reasonable measure." (http://www.marcellusmoney.org/candidate/corbett-tom)
Maryland,
our neighbor to the south, is proceeding much slower, hoping to learn
from Pennsylvania's mistakes.
"Maryland
lawmakers listened to environmentalists and residents complain in
hearings that Pennsylvania did not do enough to address environmental
concerns. Pennsylvania facilities were not prepared at first to treat
the volume of contaminated wastewater, they said, and some of it was
trucked to water treatment facilities outside the state and released
into waterways."
("Maryland
May Put The Brakes On Fracking"
www.post-gazette.com, March 29,2011)
Yes,
Maryland is actually studying Pennsylvania's fracking experience to
learn from our mistakes. Who have we learned from? Wyoming? Arkansas?
Here's an
excerpt from a March 8, 2011 Associated Press article with a Cheyenne,
Wyoming dateline:
"Folks who
live near the gas fields in the western part of this outdoorsy state
are complaining of watery eyes, shortness of breath and bloody noses
because of ozone levels that have exceeded what people in L.A. and
other major cities wheeze through on their worst pollution days.
"The gas
industry has drilled hundreds of wells in the basin (Upper Green River
Basin) over the past decade and made the basin one of the top
gas-producing areas in the U.S.
"Ultimately it comes down to accountability," said Linda Baker,
director of the Upper Green River Alliance. "It doesn't seem to me the
companies are being very accountable to the residents here." High
ozone, she said, gave her a constant nosebleed three days last week. "
In
Arkansas a recent increase in earthquakes led the oil and gas
commission of that state to impose a moratorium until at least July on
drilling new wells with fracking fluid. It is suspected that injecting
millions of gallons of waste fracking fluid under the ground with such
great pressure may be responsible for the increase in earthquakes. So
the Arkansas Geological Survey is doing a thorough study before
further wells can be drilled.
It seems
there is much yet to learn in Arkansas and in Maryland and in every
other state, including Pennsylvania, about the long-term consequences
of fracking.
I agree
with a growing grassroots movement of people who just want a stop to
the drilling until we see clear evidence that our government has as
much concern for our grandchildren and us as it does for big
business.
After all,
"We only have one chance to get this right!"
Comment on this
Commentary - Comments should be directed to Ken Ralph, Editor of
LCDC Media at his
email
address.
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