http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/01/25-6

Published on Friday, January 25, 2013 by Common Dreams

Pennsylvania’s DEP begins study on radioactivity from oil, gas development; follows other studies showing high levels of radium, boron
by- Andrea Germanos, staff writer

The controversial drilling practice known as fracking is under renewed scrutiny, this time for producing radioactive waste.

A resident holds up contaminated water from her well, located near a fracking site. (Photo: Public Herald)

Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection announced Thursday it was embarking on a year-long study of radioactivity in by-products from oil and natural gas development.

But findings and any action from the study may come too late for people like Portage, Pennsylvania resident Randy Moyer, who is suffering from a flurry of health problems he believes are the result of radiation exposure from his work transporting fracking wastefluids. Pennsylvania’s Beaver County Times reports:

Moyer said he began transporting brine, the wastewater from gas wells that have been hydraulically fractured, for a small hauling company in August 2011. He trucked brine from wells to treatment plants and back to wells, and sometimes cleaned out the storage tanks used to hold wastewater on drilling sites. By November 2011, the 49-year-old trucker was too ill to work. He suffered from dizziness, blurred vision, headaches, difficulty breathing, swollen lips and appendages, and a fiery red rash that covered about 50 percent of his body.

“They called it a rash,” he said of the doctors who treated him during his 11 trips to the emergency room. “A rash doesn’t set you on fire.”

Moyer spent most of last year in his Portage apartment, lying on the floor by the open screen door because his skin burned so badly, while doctors scrambled to reach a diagnosis.

Rather than putting the brakes on fracking, the DEP study appears to cement the industry’s foothold. John Hurdle writes in the New York Times’ Green blog:

Kevin Sunday, a spokesman for the department, said the new study, which covers both conventional oil and gas development and hydraulic fracturing, was not a response to any evidence of excessive radiation levels at drilling sites. Rather, he said, it is a “forward-looking” exercise that anticipates the long-term expansion of the industry.

“We recognize that the industry is here to stay, and we want the public to be protected,” Mr. Sunday said.

A recent study out of Penn State looking at wastewater, also called flowback, from fracking in the Marcellus shale found high levels of radioactive radium and barium.

“Improper disposal of the flowback can lead to unsafe levels of these and other constituents in water, biota and sediment from wells and streams,” the researchers said.

A 2011 study from the U.S. Geological Survey also found that fracking wastewater can be highly radioactive.

Despite numerous studies on fracking’s dangers, the NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), in a release on its May 2012 report that looked at how Pennsylvania gas companies dealt with the waste from fracking, stated:

All currently available options for dealing with contaminated wastewater from fracking inadequate to protect human health and the environment.

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20130124/ARTICLES/130129719/1350?Title=Marine-sanctuary-expansion-praised-at-hearing

Santa Rosa, California

By GUY KOVNER
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Published: Thursday, January 24, 2013 at 8:36 p.m.
Last Modified: Thursday, January 24, 2013 at 8:36 p.m.

BODEGA BAY – No contrary words were heard at a public meeting that filled Bodega Bay’s Grange Hall with about 70 citizens, federal officials and fishing industry representatives on Thursday night concerning a plan to protect an additional 2,770 square miles of the ocean off the rugged North Coast.

“There’s celebration in the air,” said Sonoma County Supervisor Efren Carrillo, who attended the first of three hearings on the proposed expansion of two national marine sanctuaries that have been in place since the 1980s.

“It was great,” said Norma Jellison of Bodega Bay, who sat at one of five tables where residents gave feedback to sanctuary officials.

Jellison said she’d like to see sanctuary officials establish an office in Sonoma County, possibly at the Bodega Marine Lab. “The sanctuary office in San Francisco is kind of far away.”

All the comments at her table were supportive of the proposed expansion, which will move the sanctuaries’ northern border from Bodega Bay more than 60 miles north to Alder Creek, near Point Arena in southern Mendocino County.

Oil, gas and mineral development are prohibited within the sanctuaries, which are managed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The expansion plan, announced last month, brings to an apparent end the four-decade battle to preserve the Sonoma Coast from offshore oil drilling.

Sanctuary officials said they expect to complete the approval process by July 2014.
Former Rep. Lynn Woolsey of Petaluma, who retired this month after 20 years in Congress, got hearty applause and credit for establishing the coastal protection she had sought since 2004.

“We want to protect our fishing industry and we want to protect our environment. That’s it in a nutshell,” Woolsey said.

Two more public hearings on the sanctuary expansion plan are scheduled, at Point Arena on Feb. 12 and Gualala on Feb. 13, and written comments will be accepted through March

You can reach Staff Writer Guy Kovner at 521-5457 or guy.kovner@pressdemocrat.com.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20130122/ARTICLES/130129868/1350?p=1&tc=pg

Santa Rosa, California

By BRETT WILKISON
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Published: Tuesday, January 22, 2013 at 4:01 p.m.
Last Modified: Tuesday, January 22, 2013 at 4:01 p.m.

Plans to expand two ocean sanctuaries and put all of Sonoma County’s coast and a third of Mendocino’s off limits to oil drilling are set to get their first public airing Thursday in Bodega Bay.

Federal officials are scheduled to hold a 6 p.m. hearing at the town’s Grange Hall to discuss the proposed expansion of the protected ocean areas, announced by the Obama administration and congressional representatives last month.

Under the proposal, the Gulf of the Farallones and Cordell Bank national marine sanctuaries would take in an additional 2,770 square miles, including more than 60 miles of coast from Bodega Bay to Point Arena, in southern Mendocino County.

The two protected areas currently span about 1,800 square miles, stretching more than 50 miles off the coast in some spots from San Francisco Bay to Bodega Bay. The sanctuaries allow fishing but restrict other activities, including energy development, seafloor disturbance and discharges by ocean liners.

Thursday’s hearing, the first of three planned on the North Coast, will unveil the proposal and allow public comment on the expansion. The other two meetings are planned next month for Mendocino County, in Point Arena Feb. 12 and in Gualala Feb. 13. Written comments will be accepted through March 1.

“Our main goal is to get everyone sitting down at the table and make sure we’re hearing what their concerns are and what their suggestions are,” said Mary Jane Schramm, spokeswoman for the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary.

At least one additional round of public comment is envisioned once the federal government completes its draft environmental study. The new borders could be finalized in 18 to 24 months, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which oversees marine sanctuaries.

The action by the Obama administration would put an apparent end to the four-decade battle to prevent oil drilling off the Sonoma coast.

Previous efforts to achieve a permanent ban and expand the sanctuaries through congressional action have come up short. Rep. Lynn Woolsey, the now-retired Petaluma Democrat, saw her sanctuary bill die in the Senate in 2008 before being thwarted recently by oil-friendly House Republicans.

Environmentalists, commercial fishing representatives and others have hailed the new plans, saying they protect an important resource, and not just for wildlife.

“Sanctuaries are known allies to the economic interests that depend on a clean coast,” said Richard Charter, a veteran anti-drilling lobbyist and Jenner area resident who serves as senior fellow of the Ocean Foundation.

Given the large North Coast crowds that have turned out in the past to oppose drilling proposals, Thursday’s hearing on enhanced protection for the coast could mark a historic turning point, Charter said.

“People have been waiting for this opportunity for a long time,” he said. “It’s finally something we can avidly support.”

You can reach Staff Writer Brett Wilkison at 521-5295 or Brett.wilkison@pressdemocrat.com.

____________

Facts
Hearings on marine sanctuary expansion
Thursday, 6 p.m., Grange Hall, Bodega Bay
Feb. 12, 6 p.m., Point Arena High School, Point Arena
Feb. 13, 6 p.m., Gualala Community Center, Gualala
Public comment will be accepted through March 1. For more information, visit http://farallones.noaa.gov/manage/northern_area.html

Special thanks to Richard Charter

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 22, 2013
4:46 PM

CONTACT: Senator Bernie Sanders

Michael Briggs (202) 228-6492

WASHINGTON – January 22 – Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) today issued the following statement welcoming President Barack Obama’s support for action to combat climate change:

“The president is right to make action on global warming a central goal of his administration. The overwhelming scientific consensus is clear. Unless we take bold action soon the temperature of our planet could rise by up to 8 degrees Fahrenheit. That would be catastrophic. The Senate is about to vote on more than $50 billion in aid to help recover from Hurricane Sandy and insurers tell us that is only a fraction of the price we will continue to pay for extreme natural disasters made worse by our warming planet.

“While the president can, and must, move aggressively to use executive powers to reduce pollution and reject harmful projects like the Keystone XL pipeline, he also must help lead an effort to pass strong legislation that moves our nation away from polluting fossil fuels and toward energy efficiency and sustainable energy.

“Next month, I will introduce comprehensive legislation that will charge the fossil fuel corporations a fee for their carbon pollution. My legislation will end fossil fuel subsidies, and as the president called for, make historic investments in energy efficiency and sustainable energy technologies such as wind, solar, geothermal and biomass. This bill will also ensure that all Americans receive a rebate to offset any efforts by the fossil fuel companies to jack up their prices.

“The president and Congress have made some good progress in his first term, including significant investments in clean energy and strong new fuel economy standards for cars and trucks. To put meaning into the words he eloquently expressed in his Inaugural Address, and to protect our planet for our children and grandchildren, we must do much, much more. We must do nothing less than transform our energy system away from fossil fuels into energy efficiency and sustainable energy. When we do that we will not only lead the world in a new direction but create millions of jobs in the United States.”
###

United States Senator for Vermont

Published on Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Environmentalist and indigenous groups rally against Northern Gateway and unfair proceedings in British Columbia
– Lauren McCauley, staff writer

Protesters braved a rare, wet snow as they demonstrated against the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline in Vancouver on Monday Jan. 14. (Photo:Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)Thousands of activists marched on downtown Vancouver Monday to protest the nature of public hearings on the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline, claiming that “the public” opponents of the pipeline are being locked out while industry backers are given special access.

Buoyed by the recent vigor of the Idle No More campaign, environmental activists, indigenous groups and other opponents of the proposed tar sands pipeline condemned the public portion of the National Energy Board (NEB) panel hearings on the basis that they limit public comment.

“They’re constraining the dialogue,” said protest organizer Suresh Fernando, explaining that the presenters are being restrained in what they can say. For example, they “can’t make reference …to the oilsands and the bigger picture.”

Despite being heralded as “public”, the hearings are restricted to presenters, members of the NEB panel, industry backers including Enbridge representatives; members of the community are secluded to a seperate venue where they watch the proceedings via live stream.

According to a blog post on the Pipe Up Against Enbridge site, “the process set up to review the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline and tankers project, is keeping the public out of the public process.”

They continue:

Anyone who wishes to witness the proceedings can only do so at a separate hotel, three kilometres away, via a video feed.

This separation of public from public process is happening only for the community hearings in Victoria and Vancouver. These hearings are the only substantive opportunity for concerned citizens to share their concerns with the panel. They should also be the opportunity for us to witness our friends, neighbours, and community members, to watch and listen to the diversity of voices, the diversity of reasons for opposing tankers and pipelines.

Because it is through bearing witness, through listening to each other, that we build community and can work together to take whatever steps are needed to protect our coast.

But we are being denied witness.

In an address to the crowd outside, Eddie Gardner of the Stó:lo Nation blasted Stephen Harper, the Canadian Prime Minister, and other conservatives for recent changes made to environental laws declaring, “the Harper government has one of the most aggressive, high-carbon strategies in the world.”

He continued:

[Harper] implemented that legislation, it has become law, and he did it with crass and ruthless disregard for the environment.

Stephen Harper is hell bent to expand the tar sands.

Canada is coming alive to Harper’s real agenda… He is one of the biggest enemies of the environment.

The Canadian Press reports that the protests were “bolstered” by the “nationwide Idle No More campaign, which brought First Nations from as far as the Haisla Nation on the North Coast, near the would-be tanker port of Kitimat, B.C.”

The joint review panel is canvassing communities throughout B.C. and Alberta for comment on the proposed pipeline and has scheduled eight days of community hearings in Vancouver in the coming weeks. According to NEB spokeswoman Kristen Higgins, “(Whatever) information is on the public record is the information the panel can use to write their reports and make their recommendations.”

_____________________

Those who did make it in to the hearings did so with great effort. According to Pipe Up Against Enbridge, presenters had to register 18 months ago and schedule a presentation six months ago, “all without knowing when or where you would be speaking.” Reporting on some of the pipeline opponents testimonies, they wrote:

Dr. Gerald Graham, trained in marine response by the Canadian Coast Guard, said “the consequences of a major spill could be catastrophic and irreversible.” Reverend Ken Gray, an Anglican priest, reminded us to not treat others—including First Nations and all of creation—as we do not wish to be treated. This project, he said, “will injure us all and provide a shameful heritage for generations to come.”

A tar sands worker, Lliam Hildebrand, said that he would rather be using his trade to work in renewable energy. He shared with the panel a survey he conducted with his coworkers, “the hands and feet of our energy future.” A strong majority of these workers support a moratorium on raw oil exports and the transition of oil and gas subsidies to the renewable energy sector. “Workers in the oil sands understand that this project doesn’t make sense to Canada.”

_____________________

Outside of the hotel where the panel is taking place, a group of local multi-media artists erected a 25-foot-long installation called Hope the Whale. Twitter posts (#hopethewhale), videos and photos are projected onto the white whale’s skin, “to symbolize the expansive and growing community of people with a vision of an oil-free coast in BC,” wrote the group Pipe Up Against Enbridge.