I take issue with Professor Robert W. Chase’s Jan. 25 commentary that people who are concerned about the safety and environmental impacts of shale drilling are spreading myths (“Five myths about ‘fracking’ ”).
We know with certainty that the oil and gas industry is not capable of extracting and processing shale oil and gas safely. In Pennsylvania alone, companies drilling in the Marcellus shale were cited over 1,600 times for violating state regulations between Jan. 1, 2008, and Aug. 20, 2010.
The Pennsylvania Land Trust Association identified 1,056 as likely to endanger the environment or the safety of communities.
The categories include, among others, improper discharge of industrial waste, faulty pollution-prevention practices, inadequate blowout prevention and improper well-casing construction.
Chesapeake, which has drilled the most wells in the Marcellus shale, has the most violations, and, just last year, was given Pennsylvania’s largest-ever fine (more than $1 million) to an oil and gas company for contaminating the water supplies of 16 families in Bradford County.
There’s no reason to expect the drilling companies’ record to improve in Ohio.
Evidence is consistently being reported of drilling’s threats to water supplies, air and health. Duke scientists report in Scientific American that the closer drinking water wells are to active natural gas wells, the more likely it is that methane contamination will occur.
Award-winning biologist Sandra Steingraber, testifying before the New York Assembly on the adequacy of its new regulations, warns that every phase of the drilling process has the potential to increase the risk of bladder, lung and breast cancer and other serious diseases.
As communities become aware of the growing dangers, more and more are either banning or declaring a moratorium on drilling. Those that ban see the transformation of their environments into heavy industrial zones and the risks to health and safety as unacceptable.
Those that declare moratoriums seek time to strengthen and revise their regulations and wait for the federal Environmental Protection Agency studies assessing the safety of shale drilling, due to come out this year.
Unlike other states, Ohio permits shale drilling before revising its regulations. Gov. Kasich pledges to strengthen regulations, but not to scare business away. I fear we are likely to get the “strongest regulations” industry is willing to approve.
Ralph P. Cebulla
Professor emeritus, Hiram College
Hiram
