Dimock Natural Gas Drilling

[cazzajecko]

Yes yes the water was ALWAYS polluted..you HEARD the mining people.

[ljones121]

oh and for the record when they frac the wells, there is no possible way for the water to get contaminated, the wells are cased with 3 diffrent sets of pipe, and are cemented back the whole way as they drill. so the fracking fluids can't escape the well, we've been doing this for 40 yrs, so i'm pretty sure its safe.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@ljones121 There's Benzene and other petrochemicals all over in the water around Sublette Wyoming. Fracking is the only industrial activity out there. Nothing is impossible. And they do not cement the whole way down in Pennsylvania, by the way. Under Chapter 78 of PA environmental regulations, frackers, only cement down to 100 feet below the freshwater aquifer.

For the record.

[avkurt]

@ljones121 Pretty sure just does not fly with me.

We know the track record of the industry, we know how they lie to everyone, we do not need the gas right now, the list goes on. They can not do it safely in any aspect.

[cole909cole]

its people like you that make life so much more difficult that gas in your water has always been there you just didnt know it and your just a stingy women who wants more money they dont hurt the land and cabot oil is shipping in water constantly for whiners like you so quit complaining and cash your check

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@cole909cole there was not so much methane before that things exploded. Everyone knows there has always been methane, but the Susquehannah wasn't bubbling before the drilling started, either.

[cole909cole]

@CleanWaterActionPA the susquehannah has always been a mess its disgusting water i hear jokes about it all the time like dont swim in there unless you want a third eye it was never good water and its probably always been bubbling

[dmanfan420]

@cole909cole

[zhzhuiui]

And not say UI of produced water is innocuous, but it wouldn't have occupied the time of the federal government at that time.

[zhzhuiui]

Re: 'wholly different', I don't see it that way. Is it just the volume of chemicals used? CO2, steam, chemical, and saltwater injection have all been used for many decades.

How much salty water with ppm levels of oil do you think is injected into the ground every single day in the U.S.? It's millions of barrels. Yet, there aren't tons of complaints about salty water because 1. they don't even know that this exists, so they don't make up stories, 2. there are very few cases of contamination.

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui If the salty water your talking about is what I'm thinking of, then it's waste water produced by the energy industry, right?

Right-- that stuff is regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act. Underground storage of waste water is the precise reason the SDWA was created. Unfortunately (and this is why I am grousing), hydrofrackers are explicitly exempted from these regulations.

It's not the safety of underground storage, it's the safety of regulation, that's protecting people.

[zhzhuiui]

@BradyDale Nice try. That's not why the Safe Drinking Water Act was created.

2. In any case, when a company drills, they still have to prove that they will not contaminate a drinking water reservoir. They're already held to this standard.

3. This isn't disposal of water. It's use in drilling. They're exempt because: a. it's not waste, it's a product for use in an industrial process, b. the volumes involved are lower, c. it's covered already (see 2. above).

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui the Underground Injection Control program was established under the Safer Drinking Water Act in the 1970s. Fact. Sure it covers other things, but underground contamination of groundwater was a major political motivator. Check out the EPA site's history of UIC.

And of course water is stored underground. In PA, 80% of it remains underground! Even worse, it's put under at high pressure, making it even more likely to find faults in the seals in the well bore and migrate.

[zhzhuiui]

@BradyDale Closer, but still no. Underground Injection covered? Yes. Groundwater contamination a major motivator? Yes.

Groundwater contamination due to underground injection of produced water as a motivator? No. It was barely on their radar screen. Haphazard landfills built to pre 1950s standards, chemical spills, mom&pop drycleaners - this is what they were mostly worried about.

If it weren't for these other concerns, UI in the oil industry would not have been controlled, at least in 70s

[zhzhuiui]

@BradyDale "In PA, 80% of it remains underground!" I understand neither what that means (80% of what?) or how that is relevant. Many other places where with O&G operations have groundwater, including shale areas.

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui 80% of the injected hydrofracking fluid. It's storage. Besides, the use is irrelevant. The point of SDWA is to protect drinking water. Any underground injection that threatens groundwater should be regulated by SDWA, but hydrofrackers have been exempted. If it's safe, why would they want the exemption? 

[zhzhuiui]

@BradyDale and d., Shale gas is in a different zone than drinking water. If it's not in a different zone, your well water is already contaminated with gas. If it is a different zone, well then, you needn't worry because they aren't fracing in your aquifer.

[zhzhuiui]

And I'm not suggesting that 6.9 billion people (where'd you get the extra 1.1 billion people?) need to or should do this. However, if someone wanted the most holier-than-thou feeling as possible, hunter-gatherer would be the way to go.

.

Similarly, it would be impossible for several billion people to only use electricity from non-fossil fuels. It just wouldn't work at all any time in the next several decades. What replacement would you suggest?

[zhzhuiui]

But all this talk about GHGs doesn't seem to be the point of the video. It tries to imply that shale gas drilling and fracing pollutes local communities in the traditional sense of the word: air and drinking water.

Fracing has been used for decades without any of these alleged problems, and suddenly some well-connected Dallasites and know-nothing-about-oil Northeasterners have "discovered" these problems?

This video is scary music, "smoke, mirrors, and bullshit", as Steve Donziger would say.

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui As I understood it, the conversation you and I were having was not about the video itself but about your statement: "Fossils fuels provided the electricity so that you could post this video on the internet." That's what I was responding to. You seemed to be implying some sort of hypocrisy for environmentalists to ... I don't know... use electricity.

In point of fact, there is absolutely no way that if the 8 Billion people on Earth tried to be Hunter Gatherers that we wouldn't ...

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui .... mostly die -- or wreck everything.

Anyway, if you want to talk about the video, fine: fracking is not an old technology. Hydraulic Fracking combined with Horizontal Drilling uses water and chemicals at a pressure and at a volume and on a scale that makes it wholly different. Petrochemicals have already been founding in water in Texas and Wyoming. Air has become awful in Texas. Folks are getting sick everywhere.

This industry is awful and it is different.

[zhzhuiui]

Again: antebellum wool industry in the South? Where?

.

Re: carbon footprint, you said different things in your each post, "lowER carbon footprint" vs. "MOST ecological way a person can live". Very dense urban vs. a long-commuting surburbanite? Probably right.

But clearly the lowest impact on the ecosystem would be as a city dweller, but to live as a hunter/gatherer. Too difficult, you say? You could also be a locavore and organic farmer in the country as well. Or Amish.

[zhzhuiui]

Fossils fuels provided the electricity so that you could post this video on the internet.

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui Umm, so what?

The abolitionists who opposed slavery weren't naked, and there clothes were most likely made from cotton and wool harvested by slaves in the south.

Did that make them hypocrites? Or did they not really have a choice if they wanted to have clothes on?

Living in cities is the most ecological way a person can live. The data on that is crystal clear, but we don't have a choice but to use fossil fuels if we live in cities. For now. We can demand change.

[zhzhuiui]

@BradyDale Wool industry in the antebellum South? Really?

"Living in cities is the most ecological way a person can live." Seriously?

[BradyDale]

@zhzhuiui You seemed to imply that using a resource makes you hypocritical if you question it's origins, so making a point about the pre-Civil War south is spot on.

The fact that the carbon footpring of city dwellers is lower than suburbanites and rural people is well documented. Both the International Institute for Environment and Developmen and the Brookings Institution have explored the lower carbon footprint per capita of Metro areas. It makes sense, if you think about it at all.

[zhzhuiui]

@BradyDale The amount of water injection for disposal dwarfs the volumes in hydraulic fracing.

Then there's always CO2 and steam injection for secondary/tertiary recovery of oil too.

Before drilling starts, a permit is needed, and the Operator has to specify what zones they'll be drilling in, where they'll frac and how to protect drinking water.

In Texas, it's the Texas RR Commission; it used to be MMS in the GOM. Contact your state agency if you have specific data.

[NewDaysOldWays1]

They are drilling a 2nd well on uncles property, putting in the pipes which go through the water levels. After these are sealed off, they drill through the center of these down deep into the gas layers 1 mile down. Still poisoning the natural water supplies! Gas drilling or oil drilling is hazardous to humans & wildlife! There's not one politician that's for drilling that's not receiving bribes from big oil/gas companies! Enron ring a bell? Now known as Atla Gas/ Energy! All Crooks!

[hopkins3435]

First off. You said it holds 50 trillion when the map in the background CLEARLY shows 500 trillion hahaha

[joeyalbergo]

That's fucked up -----

[foxkill6]

DON"T COMPLAIN PUT THAT SHIT IN YOUR CAR!!! WHO SAYS CARS CAN'T RUN OFF WATER!!!!!! LOL

[dmanfan420]

If anyone reading this wants the best way to stop fracking, call your house representatives, senators, congressmen, and governor. Tell them to enact the frac act (H.R.2766) and (S.1215). Urge them to move towards a moratorium at the state level until hydraulic fracturing can be stopped completely. In Pennsylvania, tell your house reps. to approve house bills2213,2609,2608, and house resolutions 864&381. Call your senators and congressmen and tell them to enact the

[dmanfan420]

bigblockpwr is a liar and of course obviously supports hydraulic fracturing which HAS created water contamination, ilnesses in wildlife & residents, destruction of forrests, roads, and exploded 15 water wells in Dimock. To stop drilling call you house rep's, senators, and congressmen. Visit my facebook: Aj Beegs

[bigblockpwr]

@dmanfan420 what did I lie about?

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@dmanfan420

[DuanSara2007]

you people should get the facts first before you say anything. Yes i mean you cleanwaterActionPA

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@DuanSara2007 You might want to try articulating what it is that we've gotten wrong so far. I'm extremely confident about everything it says in this video.

[onefinemofo30407]

there is nothing wrong with drilling in pa it has provided jobs yet we all may be from out of town thats only cause people in and around here in dimock is to lazy to work they would rather sit back and complain and collect are tax dollars so all i have to say is DRILL BABY DRILL!!!!!

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@onefinemofo30407 I think you meant "collect our tax dollars." Interesting point about taxes. Recent research shows that successful lobbying by the industry has enabled Range and Chesapeake, two of the largest drillers, are paying about 1/10th of 1% in income taxes, while you and I pay more like 30%. In other words, they aren't contributing anything to the tax base.

[bigblockpwr]

@CleanWaterActionPA just curious where I can find this research. I'd like to check it out

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@bigblockpwr "this research." Not sure what you mean. A big part of my research has been actually going out and having a look with my own eyes and talking to actual regulators.

Here's a fun fact for today, via PennFuture: "In 2009, Range Resources, one of the largest drillers in Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale, ... paid a rate of 0.4 percent in taxes on billions of dollars of revenue, according to Businessweek. The official corporate tax rate is 35 percent."

[hotsticker]

DRILL BABY DRILL ! Like it or not its comin.

[hotsticker]

DRILL BABY DRILL ; )

[JoeCool031619]

Clearfield county, fracking water that was gushing out for 18 hrs has officially contaminated a nearby stream. Why did it take 18 hrs to make it stop gushing you ask? b/c they had to fly in workers from TX to stop it. The work created is for texans. How does this help PA? why not hire people from around the area that is being raped & destroyed instead of flying them in from the other side of the country? $ of course! All this for 2yrs of energy.. why did my natural gas bill go up 30% in 6 mths

[impalaman1962]

Accidents do happen, but I am glad to see economy stimulation.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@impalaman1962 There would be a lot fewer accidents if we required drillers to be more careful and watched them more closely.

[clearvilletimes]

Onshore Gas Drilling Pollution Disasters have compromised water from toxic chemicals used in drilling fluids. An underground live video cam can show where toxic drilling chemical end up...in your next sip of water, in your bath water near gas drilling? This is an onshore gas drilling environmental crime! checkout clearvillles blog, see crime details

[nkolet]

Anyone can make a video like this. I can make one that proves all your theories wrong, and in fact there is proof that the water contamination was not from gas drilling.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@nkolet So do it. Show me. I doubt it will be a convincing, but give it a shot.

[bill7920]

The irony is with all the wells out west and here in the east the fuel prices have no dropped at all?

[TOYDOLLSKID]

good. hope they dont drop either. quit being cheap. fuel is cheap priced by the gallon compared to other stuff. cheap bastard

[bill7920]

Well whats the point in drilling then fuck head?

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@bill7920 be nice.

[bill7920]

@CleanWaterActionPA Sorry I just can't suffer morons anymore.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@bill7920 this is a giant mess and it could be prevented. Look at what happened to the miners and West Virginia and in the Gulf. It wouldn't have cost much to be a bit more careful in either case, but without watching, greed wins. People die.

It's silly not to have rules about being more careful and real people enforcing those rules. We need eco-cops on the beat.

[bigblockpwr]

Most of these people have no idea how the drilling and fracing process works. And all the the video of the issues are from all over, but none from PA.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@bigblockpwr What is it that you don't think we understand? We have spent a ton of time looking into drilling and feel very confident in what we're saying. If you really think we've made a mistake, then point it out rather than bandying generalities.

[bigblockpwr]

@CleanWaterActionPA the video of the water shooting in the air @0:50 is a water well that hit a pocket of shallow gas while drilling for water. why would you include it when it has nothing to do with drilling in the shale?

[BradyDale]

@bigblockpwr There's a map 50 secs in. Not sure what you're talking about.

[bigblockpwr]

@BradyDale 50 seconds in...take a look again. your looking at :05 seconds in

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@bigblockpwr It's just some scenery in Dimock. That's a shot out my car as I was going down the road in their. It's just context shots, that's all. It's shot about a quarter mile from Victoria's place.

[bigblockpwr]

@CleanWaterActionPA what a blatant lie...that video is from Ohio. your own video says it...check out @2:32. thats the same water well. And the original video is on youtube from a farmer in Ohio that actually shot the footage. You can't call it research when you make it all up

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@bigblockpwr Ooph, sheesh, relax. Looks like you're right. You know, I shot the video up there but we had an intern put it together and she grabbed a lot of clips from all over. anyway, yes, I guess that wasn't something I shot. It was a long time ago.

Does it really change anything?

[bigblockpwr]

@CleanWaterActionPA yea what other information of yours is an intern's mistake?

[hopkins3435]

@bigblockpwr haha yeah. That derrick couldn't handle more than a few hundred feet of pipe. Marcellus is a few thousand.. about 7300 feet down

[bigblockpwr]

They are just pissed because they signed leases back when it was a few dollars an acre and now people are getting $5,000+ an acre. So now they are looking for any way to get some money out of the gas companies to make up for the low dollar lease they signed a few years ago.

[ohwhatever30]

I KNOW! It is rediculous!

[Fiddle315]

Funny funny stuff. Use photos from around the workld, but don't show anything in Dimock. If the wells are hidden, then there is NO issue with the wellheads or pipelines. The well drilled on the Dimock-Brooklyn road (1/2 mile from blinking yellow light) was drilled with an Air Driller - no water used.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@Fiddle315 That's just wrong. You can't drill a fracking well without water.

And if Cabot is so great, why did DEP just shut them down?

[ohwhatever30]

I just have to ask if people are so ignorant that if they didnt know anything about drilling and had some strange person come to thier door asking for them to lease or whatever, "oh but we werent told it could harm us in anyway" WHY DIDNT YOU RESEARCH ANYTHING BEFORE YOU AGREED TO SIGN IT OVER? And on another note... seriously did you not think anything could possibly happen when people are drilling into the Earth for natural gas?????? Good LORD!!!!! *shakes head*

[07fordfx4]

We cement surface casing in, then cement intermediate casing inside of surface, THEN cement production casing inside of them, so I highly doubt that gas could seep through roughly all together about 20 thousand feet of cement. Look somewhere else for the problem. Wonder if you all will be bitching when your heating bill is half of what it used to be?? Also, we bring a lot of revenue into your economy. As for DEP, why don't they shut drilling down if they can prove it hurting you water??

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@07fordfx4 Even the slightest failure in all that cement will be exploited by the fracking process. If it can break up stone over a mile under the earth, why would you think it can't break up cement?

[bigblockpwr]

@CleanWaterActionPA because shale is much easier to break than cement. get a peice and try it. statements like this are exactly why I doubt your information.

[BradyDale]

@bigblockpwr Fine, of course it is, but if the cement fails to make a clean seal then that highly pressurized frack fluid will get in.

Regardless, it's spilled on the surface all the time. DEP tells us it's happening constantly. This water is so dirty that it killed 17 cows in Louisiana when they drank just a little bit of it. Do you really want that stuff all over the place.

[gsucooldude]

If the water faucet is catching on fire, it's nothing the industry has done. Oil and natural gas seeps are very common in areas where large amounts of oil and natural gas are. I've had this happen at my ranch in Oklahoma.

[Augbo]

Christmas 2008 -- a recently widowed female senior citizen was walking outside on her property, at the opposite end of the property as her water well cap.

An explosion split the concrete and cinder block cap in two, sending the tabletop the lady used as a manhole cover flying 20 feet in the air.

The lady's property is located near the Dimock project and was featured on WNEP-TV Channel 16 Evening News.

[mjkwyo]

SOUNDS LIKE BS !~

[mjkwyo]

SOUNDS LIKE A BUNCH OF BS

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@mjkwyo One year ago last month, 17 head of cow died because they drank some hydrofracking water. Cows are much larger than you or I. They died very quickly. Do you want to expose our water supply to those kinds of chemicals?

[mjkwyo]

Thanks for the comment

[avecaway]

When your dead from the high radioactivity that occurs in the gas expelled from shale drilling , will you worry about how low your heat bill is, and by the way I live here people areonly getting 50 bucks a month and thier wells are ruined its the old saying FOOLS RUSH IN .. Go ahead rush in. Im not signing anything , they are lying pigs at the trough and there are dead animals all over from drinking the water run off , at one farm 30 dead cows 120 dead chickens dead deer, racoons ect.....

[mjkwyo]

SHIT IS DEEPER!!!! Come on now get real !!!! Y'ALL if it's that bad I would here about it!! from a factual report! Drink another beer!I would have to agree y'alls getting short changed for sure!! DEEP GAS IS AMERICA FUEL!!~

[CleanWaterActionPA]

@avecaway Folks do feel like they made a mistake. They were misled. DEP should help them get some justice.

[Tomsmadness]

I'm very curious about the clip showing someone igniting the faucet water. I work in the industry and never witnessed an event like this, let alone someone foolish enough to try to ignite it. What's more, methane is only combustible in the right atmospheric mixture. Do you have any additional background information? I've read stories of similar events in Colorado, and also attributed to drilling. The USDOT and your state regulators should really address this.

[mjkwyo]

Methane is everywhere..

[BradyDale]

It didn't happen up there before drilling started. DEP agreed that the drillers were at fault. It doesn't take much failing in the cement seal for gas to get through since exploiting cracks is what the fracking process was created to do.

[Drkhnd08]

how come yall are having all these problems when they just started drilling up there. They have been drilling around my house since before i was born and we have yet to see any of these things yall are complaining about

[CleanWaterActionPA]

They haven't been drilling for deep shale around your house since you were born. Maybe shallow shale, but not the Marcellus formation. It's the depth of the hole and the density of the shale that makes all the difference.

[mjkwyo]

I think y'all need to walk . do y'all drive have lights, heat in the winter !! Then stop bitchin. Man has been using natural resources for thousands of years. when it's gone it's gone and then y'all will never know the wells were there. If y'all are having water problems it's probably been going on for years, ya just found a scapegoat.

[Augbo]

mjkwyo,

Heating in the winter, as well as other public utilities, is not the issue here.

At issue here is whether or not the gas drilling companies are drilling for the gas in an ecologically sound and ethical manner, and whether or not the gas drilling companies are honoring their lease contracts by paying the proper amounts on their leases.

These companies have all the ethics of a dead pet rock. They have lied to their lessors. They have destroyed the water supply. End of story.

[mjkwyo]

My apology y'all need to get the State to regulate there activity. sounds like methane has made it to surface Y'all know the pressure can push gasses and carbons to surface. These compaies should have a upmost respect for the land and aquifers below.....

[BradyDale]

That's what we're trying to do. Press the state to watch closely enough to make sure it's done right and the industry doesn't cut every corner they can.

20 square miles of aquifers have been found to be wrecked in Wyoming. A colorado man is suing drillers because he took a drink at his vacation cabin and it burned his mouth as soon as he tasted it. A house blew up in Ohio. It's crazy to say that there is no problem with this industry. There is a lot of problems.

[mjkwyo]

I would start walking, you just think you know what your talking about, look the sky is going to fall.....

[paguy3006]

Sad to say some still feel it all money with no side affects.

[mikeongreen]

Powerful video. Thanks for shining the light on this injustice!

[nosedtoo]

sooo quite now...are the Annnnimals drinking it? all gone now? money talks dont it

[GreenrootMedia]

Great Work!!!!

[nosedtoo]

ya hummmm...while still skipping to the bank! give me a break!

[CleanWaterActionPA]

The folks with leases up there are not making nearly enough to justify the quality of life losses they have had, the loss of natural beauty and, perhaps most immediately, lost property values.

[nosedtoo]

who cares!

[landofthelostful]

Everybody went skipping to the banks and now their crying. Well let me tell you something, I went on to forums and expressed my concerns about the environmental concerns and implications and ALL I found was topics on "how to get the best deal." I am the only person for miles who didn't sign and when my property becomes contaminated because of selfish disregard for the environment, I wonder if there will be enough "pitty parties" to go around for the people who really deserve it.

[murielg]

This short home-made video contains more information and in-depth reporting than I see on professional television. Wow.

[CleanWaterActionPA]

Thanks Muriel! You're awesome! Another one is coming soon!

[HempForPresident]

I can't believe I just watch water from a spigot catch fire. O.o

[CleanWaterActionPA]

Thanks! Hopefully you will like our next piece on the topic. I can promise falling trees.