energy policy, fossil fuels, natural resource management, offshore oil

Blog.Cleanenergy.org: Local Biz Owners Say Offshore Drilling is Bad for Business

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http://blog.cleanenergy.org/2014/02/19/local-biz-owners-say-offshore-drilling-is-bad-for-business/

February 19th, 2014

by Chris Carnevale
Who knows what good and bad for business on the coast better than the coastal businesses? And the coastal businesses know that offshore drilling is bad for business. Pleasure Island Rentals in Carolina Beach, NC stands against seismic testing for offshore oil and gas.

NoSeismicTestingSign

Photo courtesy Randy Sturgill.

Who would you say is the most qualified entity to talk about what’s good and bad for business on the coast of the Southeastern U.S.? President Obama? The U.S. Chamber of Commerce? Maybe Governor McCrory in Raleigh, North Carolina or Governor Haley in Columbia, South Carolina, or Congressmen who live hundreds of miles from the coast? How about businesses and business owners that live, work, and raise families actually on the coast?

While Big Oil tries to persuade public officials that offshore oil and gas drilling would be a good thing for the coastal economy, too often the voices from the coast itself are pushed aside and not represented at the table when big money is at play. We think it makes sense to ask our coastal businesses what they think.

In North Carolina, coastal businesses recently made themselves heard in a letter to the Obama administration, spurred by Governor Pat McCrory’s push for opening the Atlantic coast to offshore oil and gas drilling and recent meeting with U.S. Energy Secretary Moniz to see it through. In response to these actions, 60 North Carolina businesses-30 from the coast and 30 inland-delivered a letter to President Obama and Secretary Moniz offering the locals’ perspective and not surprisingly, they unanimously and vigorously proclaim that offshore drilling will jeopardize the coastal economy.

An excerpt from the letter:
We are writing as businesses that depend upon a healthy coast as the foundation of our economy. Visitors come to North Carolina’s coast to experience our national and state parks and engage in recreational diving, boating, fishing and surfing, among many other activities. The North Carolina Department of Commerce estimates that coastal tourism and recreation in North Carolina support more than 25,000 jobs and contribute more than 2 billion dollars to the state economy annually. Commercial fishing is also a major industry that supports more than 5,000 jobs and has an estimated annual economic impact of 336 million dollars. These industries depend on a healthy coast and thriving natural resources. […] As coastal business owners, we believe that the Governor’s push for offshore exploration is misguided and presents significant risks to our economy.
About 300 citizens showed up to the Kure Beach town council meeting to oppose the mayor’s support for seismic testing of offshore oil and gas. Photo courtesy Alan Cradick, Wilmington Star News.

At about the same time this letter from the business community was being delivered to Washington, DC, coastal citizens made their sentiments about offshore drilling quite clear in the normally peaceful town of Kure Beach, NC. The Kure Beach mayor had signed on to a letter from the American Petroleum Institute (Big Oil’s lobbying arm) in support of offshore oil and gas exploration. Hundreds of citizens showed up (notable in a town of just 2,000 residents) to a subsequent town council meeting to let the council know that they do not support offshore drilling along North Carolina’s coast nor undertaking the risky exploration process. Interestingly, Kure Beach also passed a resolution in support of offshore wind energy, showing that offshore energy can be a sound economic development opportunity, as long as its done right-with wind, not drilling. The popularity of offshore wind with coastal residents is proven with scientific polling carried out by Clemson University.

The business community’s letter and the display of public outrage about offshore seismic testing show that coastal businesses and residents are not going to put up with the pro-drilling agenda pushed by Big Oil and repeated by politicians that could leave coastal citizens and our natural resources high and dry while padding faraway pockets. These events show that coastal businesses and residents are taking a stand for what we love about the coast, how we want to sustain our economy and way of life, and what we hope to pass down to future generations. We hope that the McCrory administration and Obama administration are listening with genuine intentions of serving the public interest.

– See more at: http://blog.cleanenergy.org/2014/02/19/local-biz-owners-say-offshore-drilling-is-bad-for-business/#sthash.WHAu0o0k.dpuf

Special thanks to Richard Charter

fossil fuels, fracking, oil pollution, tar sands

Common Dreams: Promises of Prosperity, Fracking Delivers Devastating Toxic Emissions New investigative report highlights the impact of the drilling boom on Texas residents

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http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2014/02/18-3

Published on Tuesday, February 18, 2014 by
– Lauren McCauley, staff writer

fracking_banner_texas
Fracking flares around the Eagle Ford Shale sit just meters from area residences. (Photo: Earthworks/ Creative Commons/ Flickr)Residents living near the Eagle Ford Shale were promised riches and jobs when the fracking boom exploded in their region of southern Texas. However, according to a new investigation published Tuesday, with the wells came unchecked toxic emissions that would devastate both their health and the quality of their ‘easy country life.’

While much of the reporting on the negative impact of fracking has focused on the danger it poses to drinking and groundwater resources, this eight-month, joint study by the Center for Public Integrity, Inside Climate News, and the Weather Channel reveals the lesser-known impact on air quality and the unchecked and potentially lethal amounts of toxic chemicals emitted from the wells.

“What’s happening in the Eagle Ford is important not only for Texas, but also for Pennsylvania, Colorado, North Dakota and other states,” where fracking has been sold as an “absolute-game changer” for often depressed rural regions.

Since 2008, over 7,000 oil and gas wells have been drilled in the Eagle Ford Shale and, with another 5,500 approved wells on the way, it has become “one of the most active drilling sites in America.” And though the shale covers 20,000 square miles, the state has installed only five permanent air monitors, which reportedly sit on the “fringes of the shale play, far from the heavy drilling areas where emissions are highest.”

According to the report, chemicals most commonly released during oil and gas extraction include: hydrogen sulfide, a deadly gas found in abundance in Eagle Ford wells; volatile organic compounds (VOCs) like benzene, a known carcinogen; sulfur dioxide and particulate matter, which irritate the lungs; and other harmful substances such as carbon monoxide and carbon disulfide. VOCs also mix with nitrogen oxides emitted from field equipment to create ozone, a major respiratory hazard.

While there are some federal safety standards for workers who encounter these chemicals, there are no protections for people living near the drilling sites. Further, guidelines are typically set for one compound at a time without taking into account the impact of simultaneous exposure to multiple chemicals.

Through a series of interviews with area residents, the report describes a host of negative health impacts which include migraine headaches, nosebleeds and respiratory problems.

According to Robert Forbis Jr., an assistant professor of political science at Texas Tech University, the health issues faced by those living near drilling wells—not just in Texas but throughout country—”simply don’t carry enough weight to counterbalance the financial benefits derived from oil and gas development.”

“Energy wins practically every time,” Forbis said. “It seems cynical to say that, but that’s how states see it—promote economic development and minimize risk factors.”

“This crap is killing me and my family,” said Mike Cerny, a former oil company truck driver who lives a mile within 17 oil wells. The fumes from the nearby wells make Cerny and his wife “dizzy, irritable and nauseous,” while their teenage son suffers from frequent nosebleeds.

“We went from nice, easy country living to living in a Petri dish,” Myra said.

map tx fracking
An image from an earlier report on the Eagle Ford Shale, “Reckless Endangerment While Fracking the Eagle Ford: Government fails, public health suffers and industry profits from the shale oil boom.” (Image: Earthworks Action/ Creative Commons/ Flickr)

energy policy, fossil fuels, national ocean politics, natural resource management, offshore oil

The Virginian-Pilot: Crucial study nears for offshore drilling in Virginia

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http://hamptonroads.com/2014/02/crucial-study-nears-offshore-drilling-virginia

By Bill Bartel

© February 19, 2014

Drilling for gas and oil off Virginia’s coast is still forbidden, but proponents hope a federal study due within two weeks will let them at least start looking for places to set up drilling rigs.

Industry officials are seeking federal permits to conduct seismic testing – using airguns to bounce sound waves off the ocean floor and deeper formations – to explore anomalies that could indicate the presence of oil and gas deposits.

A long-awaited environmental impact statement needed in advance of the testing will be released this month, according to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. The analysis will examine how seismic surveys in the mid- and south Atlantic would affect marine life and what must be done to mitigate possible harm.

Nine companies have requested permits to conduct seismic surveys.

The process involves ship-mounted devices firing compressed air into the water to generate sound waves that reflect off rock formations, with the echoes monitored by equipment on the surface. Geophysicists and geologists can use the data to “see” subsurface formations with geological structures that might hold oil and gas.

The impact study, which began three years ago, included eight public hearings along the Eastern Seaboard.

At a hearing in Norfolk in April 2012, opponents objected to seismic testing, saying it would be disruptive and harmful to whales, sea turtles and other marine life. Proponents said the tests could be done safely and are needed, noting that existing oil and gas information is outdated.

For environmentalists, what may be of greater concern than seismic testing itself is what it represents: a tangible step toward drilling more than 50 miles off the coast.

“It’s the camel’s nose under the tent,” said Glen Besa, state director of the Sierra Club. He and other opponents say the environmental risks of drilling operations can’t be ignored, and he worries that burning fossil fuels contributes to climate change and rising sea levels.

Meanwhile, oil and gas industry officials say they’re gaining ground in building political support for drilling.

“From our perspective, it is moving in the right direction,” said Randall Luthi, president of the National Ocean Industries Association.

Luthi said opposition to testing and drilling “goes with the territory. We face it all the time.”

Federal sales of Virginia leases for offshore drilling were expected to begin in 2011. They were put on hold by President Barack Obama’s administration until at least 2017 after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. That explosion killed 11 workers and caused the largest marine oil spill in U.S. history.

The moratorium also includes waters off North Carolina and other areas of the Atlantic, as well as large sections of the gulf near Florida’s west coast.

Some predict that any decision to sell leases in the Atlantic will depend on the willingness of the next president, who will take office in 2017.

Several of Virginia’s federal legislators and state leaders have unsuccessfully lobbied the Obama administration to end the moratorium. The U.S. House passed at least two bills in recent years that would have permitted lease sales, but the Senate didn’t consider them.

If the government gives a green light to seismic tests, companies likely wouldn’t get on the water for six months to a year – depending on how long it takes to obtain federal and state permits and move equipment to the region, said Gail Adams, spokeswoman for the International Association of Geophysical Contractors.

Surveying all of the mid- and south Atlantic could take a year, Adams said in an email. Then there’s the onshore work of estimating the size and location of potential oil and gas deposits, which might not be completed until spring 2016, she said.

Updated mapping could make the lease sales more lucrative for the government. Better information about specific locations and quantities of hydrocarbon deposits would spur more bids and higher prices for lease sales, an industry executive told a congressional subcommittee last month.

For example, the tests would reduce the odds of expensive “dry holes,” where companies drill but don’t find significant oil or gas, said Richie Miller, president of Houston-based Spectrum Geo.

U.S. Rep. Scott Rigell, who supports offshore drilling along with Gov. Terry McAuliffe and Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner, says offshore exploration would diversify the region’s defense-centric economy.

Rigell said industry improvements, particularly since the Deepwater Horizon accident, convince him that drilling and production can be done safely and without harming the environment.

The Virginia Beach Republican, who contends that the energy industry could generate thousands of high-paying jobs in the state, is planning to bring a delegation of government and oil industry officials from Louisiana to Hampton Roads this year.

“All we’re asking for, in a reasonable way, is for the federal government to get out of the way,” Rigell said.

However, opposition remains strong.

U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott said environmental concerns are too great. He opposes offshore drilling.

“I still, to this day, don’t understand why people get so excited about what’s happened on the Gulf Coast,” said the Newport News Democrat. “When people say it will create jobs, I say, ‘You’re exactly right. See all those cleanup jobs?’ There’s billions spent on cleanup.”

Walter Cruickshank, deputy director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, said during the House hearing last month that there are no guarantees.

“I believe we made a lot of reforms and changes over the last few years that have greatly improved safety of operations on the outer continental shelf,” he said, “but we have not and cannot eliminate all risk.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter

energy policy, fracking, offshore oil, tar sands, Uncategorized

Irish Independent: UK’s Nebula gets licence to explore Irish Sea fracking

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http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/uks-nebula-gets-licence-to-explore-irish-sea-fracking-30012998.html

EPA to investigate whether State should also permit practice

Nick Webb – 16 February 2014

While ‘fracking’ may not be permitted in Ireland, UK-based Nebula Resources is planning a venture to look for shale gas in the Irish Sea.

A company run by one of the founders of controversial British fracking company Cuadrilla has been granted three licences to explore the possibility of carrying out hydraulic fracturing for shale gas in the Irish Sea, according to the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change. The licences cover areas directly across the Irish Sea, less than 100 miles from Dundalk.

Nebula Resources boss Dr Chris Cornelius believes there are huge volumes of offshore shale gas that could be drilled. If successful, it would be the first such project in the world. The company hopes to begin exploration shortly.

“Certainly offshore shale gas is a new concept, and there’s no reason with the UK’s history of offshore development that we can’t develop these resources offshore,” he said last week.

Shale gas is extracted using the controversial technique of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which involves forcing water, sand and chemicals under extremely high pressure into rocks, to break them up and release the natural gas trapped inside. Fracking has completely transformed the US energy market by producing huge amounts of gas and oil, which has improved the country’s energy security and reduced its dependence on Gulf oil.

Some environmentalists believe that fracking may damage water supplies, and seek to block the extraction of new fossil fuel resources. However, drilling offshore removes the need to deal with local communities.

Natural Resources Minister Pat Rabbitte has charged the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) with investigating whether fracking should be permitted in Ireland.

The EPA has launched tenders for a two-year study into the impact of hydraulic fracturing.

The study is more comprehensive than first planned because of the level of opposition to fracking. Some 1,356 submissions were received following a public consultation period, the majority of which were against fracking. The EPA has now included a health expert on the committee drawing up the terms of reference for the study.

Most of the onshore fracking prospects focus on a small area bordering north Leitrim and south Fermanagh, which have been identified as potentially containing billions of cubic feet of natural gas. It is likely that this gas prospect may be extracted only by fracking.

The research programme is expected to start this summer. The Government has promised fracking will not go ahead while the research programme is under way. It is likely to be late 2016 or early 2017 before any fracking takes place in Ireland – assuming that the process gets a green light.

Cuadrilla Resources is the most high-profile gas fracking company operating in the UK. It is run by Irish exploration veteran Francis Egan and chaired by former BP boss Lord Browne.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

gulf of mexico clean-up, Gulf restoration, oil pollution

Times-Picayune: BP Deepwater Horizon spill oil causes heart damage that can kill tuna, new study finds

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http://www.nola.com/environment/index.ssf/2014/02/bp_deepwater_horizon_spill_oil.html?fb_action_ids=10152204442102698&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_ref=s%3DshowShareBarUI%3Ap%3Dfacebook-like&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%5B124634777728610%5D&action_type_map=%5B%22og.likes%22%5D&action_ref_map=%5B%22s%3DshowShareBarUI%3Ap%3Dfacebook-like%22%5D

Nola.com

tuna
A school of bluefin tuna. A new study by scientists with Stanford University and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration link oil from the BP Deepwater Horizon spill to heart damage in tuna and other marine species. (Richard Herrmann/Galatee Films)

By Mark Schleifstein, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune

on February 13, 2014 at 3:03 PM, updated February 13, 2014 at 3:05 PM

Crude oil from the BP Deepwater Horizon spill contains a chemical that interferes with fish heart cells, slowing heart rates, reducing the ability of the heart to contract and causing irregular heartbeats that can lead to heart attacks or death, according to new research released Thursday by researchers at Stanford University and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The scientific paper, which will be published in the Feb. 14 edition of the journal Science, was discussed by several of the researchers at a news conference at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago.
The research was conducted as part of the federal Natural Resource Damage Assessment process required by the Oil Pollution Act in the aftermath of the spill. Its findings will help federal and state officials, working with BP, to determine the extent of damages to natural resources from the spill and how those damages should be mitigated.
Researchers took samples of crude oil from the spill and tested the effects of tiny amounts mixed with water on living heart muscle cells of bluefin and yellow fin tuna.

The tests revealed that very low concentrations disrupted potassium ion channels in heart membranes that control the flow of molecules into and out of the heart cells that in turn regulate the electrical impulses that cause the heart to contract and relax.

The studies found that certain three-ring versions of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons found in the oil – which are also found in coal tar, creosote, air pollution and stormwater runoff from land – were what blocked the potassium ion channels, which increased the time it took for the heart to restart on every beat.

Tuna were chosen for the study in part because the BP spill occurred in an area of the Gulf of Mexico where Atlantic Bluefin tuna were spawning at the time of the accident.

The effects are believed to be more of a problem for fish embryos and early developing fish, because the heartbeat changes could also affect the development of other organs, including the lungs and liver, said Nathaniel Scholz, head of the Ecotoxicology Program at NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Seattle.

Adult fish have developed gill and liver systems that can detoxify the PAHs, he said.
He said similar secondary effects were found in other fish species in Alaskan waters in the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989, including cardiac edema and deformed spines.

The research also found that weathered oil contained more of the three-ring PAH compounds, and thus was more toxic to fish, said Barbara Block, a marine biologist at the Hopkins Marine Station of Stanford University in Pacific Grove, Calif.

Block’s research has included tracking individual tuna moving into and out of the Gulf of Mexico during spawning seasons. One of those tuna moved back and forth in a part of the Gulf adjacent to the site of BP’s Macondo well a year before the accident.

The study used four different samples of oil from the BP spill: oil taken directly from the riser pipe of the well, riser oil that was artificially weathered by heating, and samples collected from oil slicks by Coast Guard cutter Juniper on July 19 and July 29, 2010, about three months after the Deepwater Horizon accident.

Soon after the news conference, BP issued a statement raising questions about the study and the use of its conclusions in the damage assessment process.

“The paper provides no evidence to suggest a population-level impact on tuna or other fish species in the Gulf of Mexico,” the statement said. “Bathing isolated heart cells with oil concentrations is simply not comparable to the real-world conditions and exposures that existed in the Gulf for whole fish.

“The bodies of live tuna have numerous defensive mechanisms that isolated heart cells do not,” the statement said. “Equally important, the oil concentrations used in these lab experiments were rarely seen in the Gulf during or after the Deepwater Horizon accident.”

The statement said the paper also doesn’t include a realistic assessment of the exposure of fish to oil and its PAH constituents, “and it is scientifically inappropriate to take data from in vitro laboratory tests on isolated tuna heart cells and use it to make unsupported predictions about effects on a variety of live marine species or humans in the Gulf – effects that no one has observed or measured in the field.”

During the news conference, Scholz said other studies under way as partof the damage assessment are aimed at the exposure question.

Meanwhile, Jacqueline Savitz, a spokeswoman for the Oceana environmental group, said it was ironic the study finding Gulf fish “suffering from broken hearts” came on the eve of Valentine’s Day, but said the results are not surprisng.

“Fish larvae are generally more sensitive to the toxic effects of oil and other chemicals than adults,” Savitz said in a statement. “Even in a healthy ocean, only a small fraction of larval fish have what it takes to make it to adulthood. So after a spill, toxic chemicals in the oil could wipe out some of the few fish that might have otherwise succeeded, which could be a major setback to a species in need of recovery like bluefin tuna.”

She said the study backs up her group’s concerns that offshore drilling remains unsafe.

“This and other studies on the impacts of the spill, underline the importance of breaking our oil addiction and not expanding offshore drilling into the Atlantic or the Arctic,” Savitz said.

The research paper concludes that the effects seen in tuna are likely to occur in other vertebrates found in the Gulf of Mexico, including shrimp and other fish species, marine mammals and turtles.

The paper also warns that the scientists’ findings may also indicate a threat to human health resulting from exposure to PAHs in air pollution, including from car exhausts.

“The protein ion channels we observe in the tuna heart cells are similar to what we would find in any vertebrate heart and provide evidence as to how petroleum products may be negatively impacting cardiac function in a wide variety of animals,” Block said in a news release announcing the paper. “This raises the lpossibility that exposure to environmental PAHs in many animals – including humans – could lead to cardiac arrhythmias and bradycardia, or slowing of the heart.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter

"Be the change you want to see in the world." Mahatma Gandhi