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In December 2014, I received a phone call from a former O&G man living in Calvert, TX (about 35 miles from College Station), part of the BCS metro area. He told me they have about 700 fracked wells up there and he has seen declines in property values, quality of life, and health.
A few of his key points:
- He was surprised by City of College Station proposed O&G regulations, they are not protective. We should make College Station O&G Regulations the model, they need to be protective of the public safety of our community, including students. This will also protect the property values of surface property owners. Without strong regulations the industry will put their profits before our environment and health. Otherwise, our property values will go down.
2. If you are 1500 feet away from a well that explodes you have no chance, especially during drilling; can only close out a well with a blow out preventer.
3. CS O&G Regulations must include evacuation & monitoring plans for every fracked well.
4. It is absolutely NOT TRUE that drilling a 10,000 foot well through a 3,000 foot aquifer is safe. He’s been in oil patch and seen pipes pulled out and eat-up with chemicals - even stainless will not hold up.
5. The drilling & initial fracturing are just the beginning. Then things get worse: workover rigs, acidizing, pumping chemicals on a daily basis. When wells start losing pressure they come in with the compressor. He has seen compressors in Houston that are as big as a ship, the noise is incredible! Ear phones are required.
6. I asked him, based on us having about 7 wells so far going in behind us and Apache’s statement about 50 to 100 wells going in, he said we could be looking at 25 years of air quality problems, longer with water.
7. Trucks - often won’t obey speed and weight limits, tickets are a cost of doing business. ‘Need for speed because of greed.’ If the City gives them an inch they’ll take ten miles.
8. Truck valves- leak and spread contaminated wastewater all over the land, including the roads.
9. Drip pots (I think that is what he called them) - he said due to problems, or missing, 1/2 gallon to 1 gallon for every fill-up will be spilled. Animals often drink this fluid and it will kill them, contaminates the ground.
10. When acidizing wells they will be using hydrochloric acid - important that our C&G regulations create a website that requires posting by companies so public knows where the wells are going in, what is going on and when they have leaks/releases so we can be prepared (to evacuate, etc.).
11. EVERY oil & gas well leaks (& vents). Dump valves can hang up & you could have gas released (can’t smell). Hydrogen sulfide- we need to know the wells in our area - check drilling reports at RRC website.
12. Each well must be monitored & have 24 hour a day security. In Calvert, high school boys are drinking at pads.
13. The CS Council has an obligation to protect us - if people die due to lax regulations we will be sued.
14. CS Council needs to create new regulations that are protective of our community and learn from what is going on elsewhere. Lax regulations that don’t address known problems encountered elsewhere will result in our having to deal with those same problems. They must be pro-active in protecting us.
15. Concrete (including casings) - deteriorates over years due to oxidation
(about 75 years), tremendous pressure and temperatures underground.
16. Each site needs a wind direction sock.
17. The pipelines have eminent domain - they can put them where they want.
18. People should be checking on a well daily, they have to get contaminated water out.
19. Critical is the escaping gas - flare, vent or pipeline is necessary.
20. CS Council must ensure that fees are charged to cover actual expenses.
21. If an explosion, etc occurs - what are our plans to notify people and get them out? Does A&M have emergency plans? If a well blows up YOYO - You’re On Your Own.
22. He has repeatedly told truckers to slow down. He has been forced to tell them if they don’t slow down he’ll go to court and have them declared a Public Nuisance.
23. Constant Vigilance will be required - speeding, leaking trucks -we’ll need police response to have the truck stopped and have the valve replaced; fire crew to clean up the hazardous spill/leaks. EVERY DAY up there is a spill - gas, leak, oil, wastewater - these all should be reported, but aren’t.
24. Videotape and 24 hour monitoring
25. Could be unlivable down here. Texas City is now called “Toxic City”
26. Check RRC well production reports & maps
27. The RRC is underfunded and beat down.
28. We ain’t seen nothing yet. After the wells -worse - accidents with truck drivers, flipping trucks, compressors, pipelines, etc.
Most people in Calvert wish it had never happened. In 2-3 years we will be wishing the same. But then it will be: YOYO - You’re on Your Own.
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Flash fire at water well burns four in Texas, including four year old child - methane leak (from fracking activity elsewhere) is likely cause:
http://www.texassharon.com/2014/08/06/flash-water-fire-burns-four-people/
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Fracking in Texas contaminates aquifer and well. RRC issues misleading and inaccurate report. Independent review reveals the truth:
http://www.wfaa.com/news/investigates/Scientists-say-state-tests-prove-fracking-to-blame-for-Parker-Co-flaming-wells-262056131.html
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Denton’s experience with fracking, why a ban on fracking is better for their community and economy, and frackers efforts to thwart democracy:
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/25429-fracked-on-their-own-petard-the-self-implosion-of-an-industry-on-the-ropes
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Graduate students at the Bush School of Government and Public Service, under the leadership of James M. Griffin, professor and Bob Bullock Chair in Public Policy and Finance, studied water consumption from oil and gas exploration in the Eagle Ford Shale for Commissioner Christi Craddick of the Texas Railroad Commission (RRC) and published their findings in the report “Water Use In the Eagle Ford Shale: An Economic and Policy Analysis of Water Supply and Demand.” Aquifers in the Eagle Ford are being drawn down at about 2.5 times their estimated average recharge rates.
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Apache to buy billions of gallons of wastewater to frack east of CCWWTP:
The City of College Station has signed a contract that allows Apache to daily for two years, buy 3 million gallons of treated wastewater/reclaimed water from the Carter’s Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant (CCWWTP) (located just behind the Emerald Forest subdivision).
This two year contract with multiple extension opportunities, also allows Apache, if available, to buy an addional 2 million gallons a day.
David Coleman, Water Services Director for the City of College Station ([email protected]; 764-3432) actively promoted this deal saying it will bring in an estimated $5 million dollars and promote economic growth.
Under the agreement, Apache would build and operate a pump station near the Carter’s Creek Treatment Plant that will transport effluent through a pipeline to private storage ponds for drilling and fracking of oil wells east of CCWWTP.
PowerPoint presentation received by the council:
http://blog.cstx.gov/2014/06/12/live-blog-thursdays-city-council-meetings-june-12/
This estimated $5 million in revenue would require the permanent removal & pollution of 2 billion gallons of water from our water cycle in the first two years if they only use 3 million gallons a day for 666 days. If they pull out the five million gallons a day for the first two years, the loss to our water cycle will be 3,650,000,000 (3.65 billion gallons).
The only clause in the contract regarding Apache’s use of the water for fracking, and hopefully, the extremely toxic wastewater generated by fracking is:
“Apache shall ensure that there shall be no nuisance conditions resulting from the distribution, the use, and/or storage of wastewater furnished by the City. Apache further agrees that reclaimed water shall not be utilized in a way that degrades groundwater quality to a degree adversely affecting its actual or potential uses.”
These frackers are drilling through our aquifer, yet industry’s own data reveals an immediate 5-8 percent wellbore failure rate and within 15-30 years 50-60 percent of wellbores have failed. What happens if our water supply is contaminated? How will we know? When will we know?
Frackers may use over a thousand different toxic chemicals, including benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene, yet they do not disclose to us what they are releasing here.
Fracking wastewater that returns to the surface brings with it radioactive and other toxic elements as well as the original toxic chemicals used in the fracking process.
Fracking wastewater is so toxic that it is required to be permanently segregated from the water cycle. No evidence exists that industry has a financially viable, technically adequate solution. Numerous catastrophic contamination events have already occured elsewhere.
Will the fracking wastewater sit in open pits - releasing toxins into the air and seeping into the ground? Will the fracking wastewater be forced into injection wells? This has caused numerous earthquakes (as has the fracking process itself) even in areas that have no prior history of earthquakes.
On average, 11 million gallons of water are used in College Station each day and we discharge six million gallons of highly treated effluent into local creeks. What will be fracking’s long-term consequences - quality and quantity - to our local water resources?
If Apache uses the full five million gallons a day and Veterans Park uses its 250,000 gallons a day, that will mean only 750,000 gallons, instead of 6 million gallons will be returned to our local creeks - what will be the impact of returning only 12.5%?
Fracking also poisons the air, with releases and leaks of methane, VOCs & nitrogen oxides (both ozone precursors), and various other toxic chemicals. However, the nearest air monitor is over 45 miles away. How will we know when our air isn’t safe to breathe? How many will get sick from polluted air?
Fracking economic analyses show expenditures necessary for road repairs (due to the thousands of very heavy truckloads) and other infrastructure costs exceed government revenues from fracking.
Fracking also has significant environmental and healthcare costs and brings with it noise, traffic, and reduced quality of life and lowered property values for nearby residents.
Fracking is now escalating in Brazos County. By the time the fracking boom ends here, there will be hundreds, possibly thousands of wells in our county, many within a few hundred feet of existing homes.
Is this the kind of growth we want?
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More drilling in College Station. The noise and traffic are noticeable. Since our nearest air monitor is over 45 miles away, we don’t know if they are poisoning our air. Our government and the oil and gas industry try to convince us that this fracking boom is justified based on economics - it isn’t.
Here is an economic analysis on fracking in Denton, Texas:
http://dentondrilling.blogspot.com/2014/07/depantsing-perryman-report-about.html?showComment=1407329731437#c7545535981170917599
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Fracking Waste puts American’s Drinking Water at Risk -
http://ecowatch.com/2014/07/29/fracking-waste-drinking-water-at-risk/
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) released an eagerly awaited report on the state of the Underground Injection Control program (UIC). The UIC is designed to protect underground sources of drinking water from the underground injection of fluids, under the authority of the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA).
More than 90 percent of produced water in the U.S. is injected into Class II wells
The EPA has identified six major pathways by which UIC wells can lead to ground water contamination, including faulty casing, an inadequate confining layer, and the presence of nearby wells that were not properly plugged. Additionally, recently discovered risks to ground water include - induced seismicity, overpressurization of formations, and the use of diesel fuel in fracking. Overpressurization is when too much waste is injected into a disposal well, causing pressure to increase to unsafe levels and the waste to back up onto the surface.
Neither the EPA nor Texas monitors groundwater quality over time to detect contamination from these Class II wells.
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Pulitzer Prize winning InsideClimateNews is getting flak from the Fracking Industry's front-group EnergyinDepth:
http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20140729/insideclimate-news-responds-steve-everley-energy-depth
Of course, if fracking was safe, industry wouldn’t have fought so hard to get it exempted from key provisions of the federal clean air and water acts and they wouldn’t require non-disclosure agreements every time they settle with residents who’ve been harmed.
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This is fracking, ten minute video:
http://blog.gaslandthemovie.com/?p=693