Fracking-- just when you get your head around one environmental disaster. . .

Thanks matto
Has the Tweed moratorium gone though?
https://www.tweedecho.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2606&Itemid=800
https://northernriversguardians.org/?page_id=445

N.Y. Assembly Approves Fracking Moratorium - NYTimes.com
30 Nov 2010 ... A vote sends a message about safety concerns related to this type of gas drilling.
green.blogs.nytimes.com/.../n-y-assembly-approves-fracking-moratorium/ - Cached - Similar
New York Governor Vetoes Fracking Moratorium, Issues Partial Ban ...
11 Dec 2010 ... New York Governor David Paterson today vetoed a bill that would have put a temporary hold on any new permits employing fracking, however, ...
ecopolitology.org › Energy - Cached

 

TECHNOLOGY does not inflate like a balloon, expanding human power over nature evenly in all directions and at all scales. It grows like a sea urchin: long spines of ability radiate out towards specific needs and desires.
Some of those spines now reach dizzying distances, allowing what would once have been impossible tasks; coaxing kilowatt hours by the million from the inner workings of atoms, or driving tiny oil pipes miles through the crust of the Earth.
But the spines are brittle, and they stand alone.
When one breaks—as happened on board the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico a year ago (see article), or at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Japan last month—there is no ameliorative technology on a par with that which has failed. Instead there is floundering; there is improvisation; and there is vast damage. What was a continuous, miraculous conduit from the depths of the Earth or the heart of the atom becomes a noxious, tangled and inaccessible mess about which, for months, nothing can be done.

There is no way to fill in the space between the spines so that they are proof against catastrophe, or easily fixable at any point of failure. But there are rules that can make it easier to cope with the failures of such brittle technologies.

The first is that the firms involved have to accept that eveeven if things seem safe and sure in day-to-day operations, disasters still happen. For years before Deepwater Horizon the oil industry planned on the basis that the blowout preventers on top of wells would live up to their name. The nuclear industry routinely tells itself that partial meltdowns such as that at Fukushima are less likely than the record shows them to be. . . . .

https://www.economist.com/node/18586658?fsrc=scn/fb/wl/ar/inplaceofsafetynets

 

Amen.

I just got done watching the documentary, Gasland. What is going on is outrageous.

 

Watched Catalyst the other day on peak oil or "the oil crunch" - the pressure for this kind of exploration and extraction is going to get insane. There are a few big problems the world is going to face over the next 50 years - we have all done a bit of research and we are taking actions in our own way, but to see a global avalanche comming in the next 5 years or so on government standard staple television does make me think that when the majority agrees with the minority then there is going to be some scary times ahead.

 

Did anyone else watch gasland ?

 

I watched this (ABC Science Crude The Incredible Journey)
https://www.abc.net.au/science/crude/
Before I saw it I thought I was up-to-speed on Global Warming.
A must see series about 1 1/2 hours

 

Yes I did.I was horrified!As I am continually at the stupidity of the money people.

 

Yes horrifying plus of course depressing .........

I have fought against many types of pollution for many years eg I was involved with the problems arround ALCOAWagerup ........


Te govt agencies supposed to be responsible for monitoring these things take a lot of pushing to get them to even try to do their job but so far eventually they do do something


we all know these companies rationalise that there will be a certain number of deaths and illness but they consider the profit is worth the downside of the possible payouts

but so far there has always been that standard they are supposed to meet ......... that is what terrified me - they can do what they like and no one can do anything

as we get shorter of oil and energy this is what we face

 

Yes all to do with "acceptable risk"

Avideo on the subject
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/12/what-is-fracking-song-explained_n_860976.html
[video=youtube;timfvNgr_Q4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=timfvNgr_Q4&feature=player_embedded[/video]

 

Great song!

People need to mobilise before governments sign off on Environmental Authorities. They are advertised and open for public comment. The trouble is there is so much money to be made from coal seam gas extraction. Another worry is that different pieces of legislation regulate different parts of the industry and well,(pardon the pun) you know what happens when different parts of government regulate different aspects of an industry, one hand doesn't talk to the other. And regulation is reactive rather than proactive.

 

Methane levels 17 times higher in water wells near hydrofracking sites

Published: Monday, May 9, 2011 - 14:33 in Earth & Climate
A study by Duke University researchers has found high levels of leaked methane in well water collected near shale-gas drilling and hydrofracking sites. The scientists collected and analyzed water samples from 68 private groundwater wells across five counties in northeastern Pennsylvania and New York.
"At least some of the homeowners who claim that their wells were contaminated by shale-gas extraction appear to be right," says Robert B. Jackson, Nicholas Professor of Global Environmental Change and director of Duke's Center on Global Change.
https://esciencenews.com/articles/2...s.higher.water.wells.near.hydrofracking.sites

 

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_T9mxfVgcs&feature=player_embedded#at=48[/video]
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_T9mxfVgcs&feature=player_detailpage[/video]
[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_T9mxfVgcs&feature=player_detailpage[/video]

 

A 60-DAY freeze on new exploration licences for coal, coal seam gas and petroleum has been announced by the NSW government in a push to resolve the escalating conflict between farmers, miners and conservationists over land use.

Read more: https://www.smh.com.au/nsw/state-fr...-new-mining-20110520-1ewos.html#ixzz1N1SSHZHW

 

The gas leak happened on Sunday at a remote location west of Dalby, about four kilometres from the nearest residence.

Arrow Energy, the company which operates the well, says it was a new well that was being prepared for gas production.

The well was uncapped to install a pump when water and gas burst to the surface, the company says.

Queensland Fire and Rescue Service crews and Arrow Energy staff have been on site overnight monitoring the situation and have established a 100 metre exclusion zone around the well.

Specialist Mines Department staff have been on site since 6am (AEST) on Monday to find out what went wrong, and staff from the environment department are also assessing the incident.

Arrow Energy says its incident response team and drilling engineers have developed a plan to stem the gas flow.

"The standard method in this situation involves filling the well with dense drilling fluids (water based drilling muds)," Arrow Energy said in a statement.

"The weight of these fluids acts to prevent the gas flowing to surface." The company says it expects the leak to be fixed within the next two to three days. Friends of the Earth spokesman Drew Hutton says it was the fourth leak to happen on this property. "Over the last 18 months we have seen pipeline blow-outs, gas migrations and well blow-outs in the Daandine-Wilkie Creek area," Mr Hutton said.

"How much longer do we have to put landowners' and workers' lives at risk in an unsafe industry?" Mr Hutton says he's dubious about whether the leak can be fixed quickly.https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1543701/Queensland-gas-leak-could-take-days-to-fix

 

[video=youtube;timfvNgr_Q4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=timfvNgr_Q4&feature=player_embedded[/video]

Here are five important natural gas facts to share with your friends and family.
1. Natural gas is not clean. Natural gas burns more cleanly than other fossil fuels, but in the course of its entire life cycle, it's actually worse than coal, long touted as the dirtiest of our fossil fuels. Because fracking involves mixing millions of gallons of water laced with chemicals into the ground at high pressure, it creates fissures in the shale that release the natural gas. Life cycle analysis expert Robert Howarth, PhD, professor of ecology and environmental biology at Cornell University, discovered that anywhere from 3.6 to nearly 8 percent of the methane from shale gas drilling escapes through venting and leaks. Methane is a greenhouse gas about 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
https://www.rodale.com/fracking-2?page=0,1

7 Key Trends That Will Affect Your Health, and the Health of the Planet
Earth Day isn't just about the earth, it's about us, too. Here are seven important ways that global environmental trends will affect us all by the time next Earth Day rolls around.

By Emily Main and Leah Zerbe Topics: fossil fuels, water pollution, organic food, earth day, clean energy, chemical farming, fracking
Press your legislators to make the right decisions about food policy, food labeling, and clean energy. Look for opportunities to buy organic and buy local.
Natural gas fracking: The fight over fracking will continue, as ecological and health threats from the fracking process become more widely known.
It's not correct to call natural gas a clean, or cleaner fuel, and it's inaccurate to say that treated wastewater from the fracking (hydraulic fracturing) method of drilling for natural gas is safe. These are marketing claims that new studies are debunking on a fairly regular basis these days.https://www.rodale.com/earth-day-trends?page=0,2

 

France Becomes First Country to Ban Extraction of Natural Gas by Fracking
By Davide Castelvecchi | Jun 30, 2011 08:27 PM | 1


The French parliament voted on June 30 to ban the controversial technique for extracting natural gas from shale rock deposits known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the web sites of Le Monde and other French media reported.

The bill had already passed the National Assembly, the country's lower chamber, on June 21, and on June 30 a Senate vote of 176 to 151 made France the first country to enact such a ban, just as New York State is preparing to lift a moratorium on the same method.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=france-bans-fracking-2011-06-30

 

Well it seems U.K. Parliament’s House of Commons Energy and Climate Change Committee is in the beasts pocket as well. In their reporting it is claimed "There appears to be nothing inherently dangerous about the process of ‘fracking’ itself and as long as the integrity of the well is maintained shale gas extraction should be safe." I ask you and any person of sound mind, can anyone guarentee the "integrity" of any well? Particularly those built in high risk areas. I guess they take the same view on Nucular Power Plants. As long as the integrity of the reactors are maintained.... Problem is we don't live in a perfect world and in the majority if cases the "peter principle" (what can go wrong, will go wrong) will apply. I think these types of gov. services should look at the potential impact of of an accident at these questionable sites rather than the feasibility of a perfectly ran system.

https://www.exxonmobilperspectives....tudy-confirms-safety-of-shale-gas-production/

 

In a very messed up way, it is pretty funny that the U.K. thinks they can guarantee the integrity of any well. This is the parent country of the company that brought you the Gulf of Mexico mess.

 

It seems the Greens are pushing for the mining companies to have to get water licences for their operations and have some sort of Commonweath legislation to regulate it. I have to find out exactly what that means. In Queensland some water licences have a volumetric limit on them and some (for irrigators) are for irrigating a particular size area. Mining operations don't need a licence. At this point, water extracted in the process of mining, including coal seam gas is regarded as produced water and they do not need a licence and do not pay anything for the water. I don't know how they will do this considering this type of water is regulated by the States and Territories.

They would be better off expanding the EPBC Act to include protection of aquifer ecological communities and expand the scope of the Act to include this instead of just regulating significant projects as determined by the Envirnoment Minister Tony Burke. This could be done by imposing very strict drawdown limits on aquifers, prohibiting fraccing in areas where there is connectivity between aquifers and get the companies to stop hiding behind commercial in confidence clauses when discloses what the hell the chemicals are that they are pumping into the ground.

 

ISTM that the water issue is the main one to worry about.
Especially pollution of the Great Artesian Basin with unknown and untested chemicals.

i wish they would stop the stunts
https://www.miningaustralia.com.au/news/exec-drinks-fracking-fluid-to-prove-its-safety
and tell us what they are using so we can make up our own minds