Road damage in Greene County

I was driving with a friend on route 221 through Greene County on Sunday to go bicycling on the Greene River trail near Rices Landing, and we found ourselves behind a brine water / residual waste truck -- presumably full of frack waste -- between Dunn Station and Ruff Creek.

Three problems:

1. The truck had no license plate!  The side of the truck said Curry Supply.

2. The truck often took up most of the road, creating a hazard for oncoming traffic.

3. There was severe road damage on route 221, perhaps from these wide, heavy frack trucks.  When I biked this road about two years ago, the edges of this road were not crumbling like this.  Damaged roads can cause a) crashes for bicyclists or motorcyclists, b) damage to car tires and suspensions, and c) additional safety problems as cars & trucks swerve to avoid holes in the road.

See photos:

https://picasaweb.google.com/pheckbert/FrackingGreeneCounty#

I'd like to visit Greene County again to go bicycling on its (formerly) nice roads but these safety issues make me think twice.  The gas industry should pay for their share of this road damage, since this appears to be so far beyond normal road wear.

 

-Paul

Pittsburgh

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Permalink Reply by Herbert G. Flavell on June 11, 2011 at 12:53pm

Kerry would you rather have this.


Its January 2011
Its January 2011 and the temperature is 21 degrees below zero. The temperature in our home is only 20 degrees. You can see our breath as the 4 members of my family breath. We are sitting with hats and coats on and blankets to conserve the oil we have left. We still have a few gallons of oil but will not be able to buy more at the $5 a gallon it now costs. The oil barons have created an oil shortage so that they can raise the price. Nothing can stop them because the Not in My Back Yard People have stopped the drilling for natural gas because of fear that the ground water will be poisoned by chemicals used in the fracturing process. So now we have no gas to heat our home and also no water because all our pipes are frozen. As I look out my den window at the mountain behind my home, I used to see millions of trees but all are gone now. The mountain, what's left is just dirt with millions of tree stumps left. The stumps are disappearing to as people cut them to to heat their homes. Other parts of the mountain are disappearing because bull dozers are looking for coal seams. The trees that are left will not last long because the wood will be used to heat 130 million homes and 19 million business's in the USA. Now each time it rains you can see the mud slide down the mountain and soon there will be no mountain because it will be in the Chesapeake Bay as silt because there are no trees to hold the soil. The 3 brooks that run in the meadow behind our home have no more fish because they are now mud with no oxygen for the fish to breath. Soon all the bays that used to supply our seafood will also be lifeless from lack of oxygen. You would think that now because all our trees are gone that there would be millions of acres to grow crops but that is not so because now when it rains the top soil runs into our rivers leaving only hard pan that nothing grows on. Maybe next year if we can afford it we will try to install electric heaters. That will still be very expensive because oil is still used to generate electric that now costs about $600 or more each month. You would think that we could use atomic power to create more electric but that's not so because a different group of Not In My Back Yard people have stopped the building of atomic power plants for fear of an explosion or radiation sickness. Meanwhile here we sit on the 2nd largest natural gas deposit in the world. Over 515 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Enough to heat our homes for 100 or more years and it sits there unused because of fear. That fear may become reality anyway as earth tremors crack the shale releasing the gas to rise into our water table anyway.Is this story fiction or will it become reality? You decide!

Now should we move into caves. I could very easily, but then our resident black bear would have no home next winter.

Permalink Reply by mark ayers on June 11, 2011 at 1:22pm
There can be no conservation without prosperity.....
Permalink Reply by Kerry parslow on June 11, 2011 at 3:59pm
There can be no REAL enduring prosperity without intelligent conservation, only depletion, degradation and eventual environmental and economic collapse.  Anyone familiar with human history understands that destructive cycle has been repeated throughout the duration of civilization.
0jw0dsu4txfuvPermalink Reply by 0jw0dsu4txfuv on June 11, 2011 at 1:02pm
Kerry, you must be from New York.
Permalink Reply by Kerry parslow on June 11, 2011 at 3:31pm

No, I live in Pittsburgh and also have an interest in property in Clearfield county, situated on the downhill side of a plateau where the landowner (already a millionaire from a lifetime of strip mining coal) has leased his farmland which is as of this week being surveyed for a wellpad.  Our water , for the house and the livestock, comes from springs that percolate through the permeable shale levels of that plateau directly below the site.  We have had the water tested and have already resigned ourselves to the inevitability of that supply being disrupted and/or contaminated by the uphill operations.  We have friends in the area who have already had water supplies damaged by the drilling -- this is not an anecdotal abstraction for me and mine:  we already know that the hydrological, agricultural and aesthetic value of the property we had hoped to live on into retirement is endangered, maybe even doomed. 

We aren't some elite urban snob treehuggers.  In fact, it might surprise you to know that we have felt we had no choice but to join a local consortium of property owners who are putting together a group leasing agreement with an attorney so that at least the lease is written on OUR terms and we can exercise some control over when and where it happens. We didn't really want to have to do this but felt it was the only way to protect what little we could in the face of the avalanche of development.  

Also, I have a degree in Geology, specializing in sedimentary stratigraphy, so I have a better understanding of what the real risks are of this headlong boom in this particular geophysical region (which happens to be quite different than the other areas of the country where hydrofracking has taken place.)  And I would argue I have a better understanding of the drilling process than most of the people so eager to jump on the bandwagon.  A good friend of mine was one of the engineers who worked on developing hydrofracking and oversaw some of the first wells drilled in PA.  He and I have had a lot of conversations over how it works. Unfortunately, he is no longer overseeing Marcellus operations -- I trusted his ethics and conscientiousness more than I do the bulk of the operators currently working.  He parted company with the outfit and left the country to work on other mining projects -- he is too discreet to discuss why but my sense it was that they found him too conscientious for their profit motive.

 

That estimate you quote of "energy for 100 years" is completely lacking in support.  And your scenario of clearcutting for home heating is just plain silly.  I'll give you credit for a colorful imagination.  But then making up bizarre scenarios is more fun than dealing with reality, isn't it?  There is more present threat to the Chesapeake watershed from the erosion and bromide pollution from hydrofracking than from any conceivable impact from timber cutting.  And there is plenty of clearcutting being done for large wellhead and compressor station complexes, if you want to get into that. 

 

That hysterical riff on "January 2011" was pretty incoherent.  You mean last winter?  As I recall it was a fairly average month,  In fact, NOAA records state the average high was 30 and the average low was 18.  http://www.erh.noaa.gov/pbz/PITLCDJAN  

Should we presume you meant to place your little bit of science fiction at a future, rather than past date?

 

All indications are that winters are becoming less cold, not colder, and improvements in home insulation, smaller and more efficient buildings, energy saving climate control technologies and alternative energies could have a much greater impact, with longer sustainability, less environmental damage and greater economic prosperity than a headlong siphoning off of a high-cost, dirty production resource like shale gas.  And have you been ignoring the reality that a good proportion of this gas is going to be sold offshore?  How is that helping heat YOUR home?

 

Instead of constantly seeking MORE MORE MORE finite sources to drain to fuel our wasteful lifestyles (and swell the pocketbooks of wealthy investors), why are we lagging behind the rest of the world in developing profitable technologies and adopting rational lifestyle changes that would reduce our consumption?  If every house had a set-back thermostat and proper insulation, if every person who could took public transport or rode a bike to work at least one day a week, if the nation would commit to more support for alternative energy and such things as convenient inter-metro high speed rail systems, we would not have to keep developing increasingly more problematic fuel extraction situations like offshore drilling (remember the Gulf spill last year?), shale gas or tar sands that are now being exploited since we have long since sucked near dry the "easy" sources of land-based crude oil deposits.

 

This is a false "prosperity" , and one we will pay a heavy price for if we don't approach it with good sense and informed caution.

 

Nowhere have I urged a permanent ban on shale gas hydrofracking,  NY state has not either, theirs is a moratorium and they are frankly looking to PA as a guinea pig to see what problems we are saddled with from our headlong blind rush into the boom.  They are as smart to hold off until more is known about the unforeseen impacts as PA is stupid to let ourselves be that guinea pig.  

Permalink Reply by Jim Walters on June 11, 2011 at 3:53pm

I'm curious . . . (and I'm not trying to be cute here)

 

When has an oil, gas, or coal company ever (largely) benefited the small land owner like you guys? What were the long term effects of their actions and would you do it all over again if given the chance. . . . 

 

You guys don't seem to like to hear what Kerry has to say, but, I hate to say it . . . this drilling that is taking place may be on YOUR soil, but It effects us ALL..... so why all the angst over a little opposition?

 

Do you guys think we are all bitter, angry, jealous people bent on keeping you poor or what? That is small mindedness.

 

Now if you want to keep this closed to us undesirables you will have to go private (something you CAN do by the way) password protection and all that. . . . .this is the internet after all . . . 

 

AND what's up with this city folks vs. country folks thing? Wow man . . . 

 

I'm learning a lot here from you guys and will be reading mostly . . . but from time to time I'd like to feel I had the right to rebut something I don't agree with. ... or give a large hoowaa to Kerry :-) who I do agree with . . . . 

 

Remember you learn from trying to disprove a point

You learn from trying to prove a point

You learn nothing from backslapping "yes" men . . . . (ask George Bush)

Permalink Reply by Kerry parslow on June 11, 2011 at 3:54pm

Huh, "glorious endeavor".  Boy, somebody drank a gallon of the O & G marketing Koolaid.

Like I said, we are in the process (not that we want to) of arranging to lease our land to the encroaching drillers.  Yes, we will make some money off of it, but frankly, we would much rather have our land, water and air clean and protected for ourselves and the family that would inherit it than get even 3 times the money.  We are only doing this because it is the only way we can see to have some say in what happens since we are surrounded by other landowners who clearly don't care about losing their property values to a short term destructive industrial boom.  The fact is that we would not even be able to sell the property any more for what it would cost to replace it with a similar non-threatened location because it is no longer rural and pastoral but industrial.  We are heartbroken at being forced into this state of affairs and no amount of "compensation" is going to make that better.

 

This site says it is for "All people, company and places related to the Marcellus Shale."  We qualify, do we not, as potential leaseholders and property owners directly affected by adjacent drilling?  What would be the sense of preaching to the converted?  Is this just supposed to be a site where you'all pat yourselves on the back over your "glorious endeavor"?  When I see people basing their beliefs and actions on lack of or mis-information, I feel it is my duty to provide more insight.  Take it or leave it.  This is an important issue that has repercussions for EVERYONE in the state and even the world (pollution and greenhouse gases don't respect borders), not one that should be decided based on marketing sound-bites, local self interests and industry payoffs.

Permalink Reply by Daniel Rupert on June 11, 2011 at 4:30pm
I read Chevron is building a BILLION DOLLAR plant in Pa. or W.Va. for a plastics mfg. plant ...and will be using by-products of natural gas drilling as the energy source...cracker plant. Does anyone have any details on this? I heard it will take thousands of workers to build on a short term basis...then thousands of workers to staff on a full time basis. This will be their fifth such facility in the states...sounds like progress to me. Also, I read an article (Rueters), that natural gas will displace coal as the number 2 energy source by 2017 and that it will displace oil as the number 1 energy source by 2035. I know you can't believe everything you read or hear but is seems very clear to me that this opportunity to become energy independent is a done deal. I live in Murrysville ,Pa. (home of this countries 1st gas well) When I hear people bash natural gas, I ask them three questions...1.)How do you heat your home 2.)How do you cook your food? 3.)How do you dry your clothes...silence everytime! AMAZING! We all love clean water and air...and I feel we have a lot of work ahead of us to improve the technology to insure cleaner air and water during the second coming of the industrial revolution!
Permalink Reply by Herbert G. Flavell on June 11, 2011 at 5:39pm
You write a great reply Kerry. That little story I wrote was written in 2010. I was going to change it before I clicked reply but I left it because it had gone to 21 below zero here last January. I'm glad your going to join a group and you will be glad you did. The way some detractors are screaming about all the bad things happening from fracking, it should be very abandoned here in Susquehanna county. We had 234 wells drilled here last year and are up to 118 so far this year.Bradford county next to us had over 900 wells started last year. So far only 14 people are complaining about tainted water. But there are others in the same area that say the water has been bad for years before the gas drilling started. This has been farmland for over 200 years. The water table is also just below ground level. We built a pond 23 years ago for fire protection. The pond was going to be 450 feet long 150 feet wide and 30 feet deep. It filled with water so fast that they almost lost a D-8 bulldozer. Like I posted before there has been gas in water here for hundreds of years. Living on a gas deposit created a few billion years ago is either a curse or a gold mine depending on your outlook. Even without drilling, every year there are hundreds of earth tremors. An earth tremor even a thousand miles from Susquehanna county can fracture the shale 8,000 feet below our feet and release the gas trapped in the shale. So by drilling it will help to take that gas release away allowing for better water in the future for our kids that we will leave our land to. We leased our land along with a group of neighbors in Jan. 2008. We have 1203 acres. We only have about 12 wells near us because there is no gathering line here to send the gas to market but that's being built now. Here is a few hints for your lease when you join us. Our lease requires a water test before and after drilling is completed.At the drillers expense. If it gets tainted they fix it at their expense. Another good thing in our lease is if a well blows up and causes damage to a neighbor the driller will defend you and pay the damages if your sued. A well cannot be closer than 500 feet from a home,barn or water well. Roads built to the pad are either planted over after drilling is completed or left for the owners use. I could use that road to go to my 2nd pond about 800 feet from our home. At 77 years old its difficult to walk that far. Now for the goodies that drilling does. It keeps the cost of heat down for people that use gas and keeps the cost of oil lower to be competitive. It creates thousands of jobs. It helps create hundreds of new companies that hire people. The railroads are expanding to bring in pipe and sand and other equipment needed to drill. Roads are repaired by the drilling companies to better condition than the state, county and townships fix them. Williams- Alexco has a well 2 miles from me. They repaired the road to the best condition its ever been with over 100 loads of stone and hard pan. It lowers school tax that in 23 years has cost my family almost $100,000. The schools join in leasing their land to. Our school district leased for $1,000,000 but instead of lowering our tax they spent $800,000 on a new office building. That's another subject I could write a book about. Before I forget hold out for the best deal you can get. The drilling had only started here when we signed for $300 an acre and 12 1/2 % royalty. But no one knew then that it would go into the thousands per acre. Join us I think you will be glad you did.
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Permalink Reply by Jim Litwinowicz on June 11, 2011 at 6:30pm
@ Kerry  

HHmmnnn   Lots to do here.  First, these states have some of the highest pollution in the US because of use of diesel and coal ...maybe converting all those 18 wheelers will to CNG and coal fired electrical plants to nat gas will help reduce the pollution.  Then you post to a IEEE article.  Thats Electrical Engineers...hardly the experts on either oil and gas extraction or environmental impacts of such.  And the article quotes a couple of studies that have been severely discredited.

 

Now you need to explain how there will be no long term benefits to our communities after the O & G companies pay out $250 to $500 billion in royalties, along with hundreds of billions in signing bonuses, along with billions in taxes, along with creating 200,000 jobs..all of which will pay taxes..... along with hundreds of billions more for supplies and support personnel, along with the hundreds of thousands of secondary and tertiary jobs.  All of this spread out over 75 to 100 years. You know....."short term benefit."

If you can accomplish that, then explain how using 500 trillion to one quadrillion MCF of nat gas won't help reduce foreign imports. And explain how redeveloping the US based chemical industry on new feedstocks derived from wet gas won't reduce imports or benefit the country.


Windfall profits????  So a company gets an eight percent ROI and that's windfall profits?  Why not go after Google...or Microsoft...or Facebook... all of which get ROI exceeding 50%??


Government subsidies?  What "subsidies" do they get? Sure they get some tax breaks to encourage state side R & D and reduce imports but that is different than subsidies.  And if you want to cry about either tax breaks or sibsidies, then lets discuss the ethanol industry which get huge subsidies and is driving the cost of food sky high.  Or all the tremendous tax breaks given the solar or wind industries. These pathetic scams wouldn't even exist if they didn't get tremendous incentives rammed through by watermelons and all paid for by fellow tax payers. And even with all these huge give aways, solar and wind are still twice as expensive as nat gas.  And if you do some research, you will find that both solar and wind may be just as damaging to the environment as any other form of energy. Did you know there are more than 14,000 windmills that have been de-activated in the US? Yep 14,000!!

 

Wake up; Dude!

Permalink Reply by Kathleen Elsie Gibbs on June 11, 2011 at 5:47pm

We need the gas and oil that we can harvest from the earth. Sticking our heads in the ground and refusing to use the bounty God gave is is sheer foolishness IMO.

Instead of making trouble both sides just need to remember that there are possible future problems and  possible future benefits from what has been happening. And it is going to continue for many years to come.

We can make of it a good experience for all or a miserable experience for all. Your choice.

Permalink Reply by Paul Heckbert on June 11, 2011 at 7:20pm

Here's an article from Time Magazine worth reading

 

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,2062331,00.html

 

It's titled "Could Shale Gas Power the World?" but an equally accurate title, based on the article contents, would be "Pennsylvania Sells Out to the Gas Industry".   An excerpt:

"There are only a few thousand wells now, but there will be far more," says Anthony Ingraffea, a structural engineer at Cornell University. "What will life be like when there are 100,000 wells here?"

That's the fear of many Pennsylvania residents. It's not just the worries about what might be happening to their water; it's also what they know is happening to their communities. Trucks crowd country roads, ferrying drilling fluid and equipment to and from wells. Jobs are up, but some businesses have suffered as employees have fled for higher-paying jobs in the gas industry. As rig workers have snapped up every available room in tiny towns, rents have skyrocketed, punishing low-income families who don't own their homes. Those who had moved to the area for a quiet Pennsylvania — and those who've valued that peace for generations — feel betrayed.

What will Pennsylvania be like 20 years from now?  Will the rivers that came back to life after decades of pollution by steel and other industries now be re-contaminated, long-term, by spills and dumping of frack wastewater?  Will rural Pennsylvanians have clean well and spring-water?  Will urban Pennsylvanians have clean municipal water?  It doesn't appear so, on our current trajectory, between the short-term profit-driven gas industry, the limited resources and regulatory power of the DEP, and the cozy relationship between Corbett and the gas industry.

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