EnviroPolitics Blog

Shale gas fracking gets a new black eye: Illegal dumping

AP file photo

The natural gas drilling industry, under continued environmental criticism last week at public hearings in New Jersey and New York (see Related Stories below), suffered another public relations blow Thursday in Pennsylvania with the arrest of a truck driver who admitted dumping some 800 gallons of synthetic drilling fluid on state game lands.

The Morning Times reports that:

“a large pool of viscous black fluid was discovered on Pennsylvania Game
Land 219 off Regan Hill Road in Warren Township by a neighboring
resident. The pool was reportedly two-to-three inches deep and covered
an area of approximately 2,100 square feet on the 5,691 acre hunting
preserve.”

Josh Foster

Police said that the driver, Josh Foster, 27, from Temple, Ga., admitted dumping the material and was charged with a third degree misdemeanor–“scattering rubbish”–by Pennsylvania State Police.

Drilling company took full responsibility
The only good news for the shale gas industry is that, when it learned of the incident, Talisman Energy Inc., the company operating the gas well from which the fluid apparently was trucked, notified police, determined the identity of the driver, and took full responsibility for the cleanup.

Talisman officials noted that Foster is not their employee but was working at the time for a local trucking
company subcontracted by Talisman.

Pennsylvania needs to sharpen its dumping law

One obvious lesson from the incident is that state law needs significant tightening up.
The penalties for “scattering rubbish” can hardly be an adequate disincentive to such environmental crime.

Pennsylvania should consider imposing a manifest paperwork trail system like one
adopted years ago in New Jersey to track the shipment of hazardous waste.

Requiring the submission to the state of a manifest for each load of waste shipped or transferred helps assure that hazardous material actually ends up at the designated
disposal facility.

Tell us what you think in the opinion box below. If one is not visible, click on the tiny ‘comments’ line. We encourage signed responses but also accept anonymous submissions.

Our most recent blog posts:
NJ court orders hearing on ‘no further action’ decision
Former NJ Gov. raps current NJ Gov. on RGGI pullout
Anti-fracking bill clears NJ environmental committee
Need mulch? Give almost any town in North Jersey a call
Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today

———————————————————————————————————————————-

Like this post? You’ll love our daily newsletter, EnviroPolitics
Try it free for 30 days! No obligation. Cancel anytime with one click

Shale gas fracking gets a new black eye: Illegal dumping Read More »

NJ court orders hearing on ‘no further action’ decision

This post may interest businesses and property owners affected by New Jersey’s contaminated site cleanup rules and be of particular value for attorneys and consultants who make a living interpreting and executing those directives.

The Cole Schotz law firm’s Environmental and Energy Department reports today on a NJ Appellate Division ruling that a property owner is entitled to
have an administrative hearing regarding the rescission of a no further
action letter (“NFA Letter”) by the state Department of Environmental Protection.

In this case, a subsidiary of
Hartz Mountain Industries, a former landlord of an industrial tenant
named Crompton Colors, Inc., appealed DEP’s rescission of an NFA Letter
issued in 2002 and the denial of its request for a hearing to contest
the decision.

You’ll find attorney Douglas I. Eilender‘s full report here.

Our most recent blog posts:
Former NJ Gov. raps current NJ Gov. on RGGI pullout
Anti-fracking bill clears NJ environmental committee
Need mulch? Give almost any town in North Jersey a call
Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today

Fracking foes celebrate a win but cannot declare victory

NJ court orders hearing on ‘no further action’ decision Read More »

Former NJ Gov. raps current NJ Gov. on RGGI pullout

Former New Jersey Gov. Tom Kean

Former Republican Gov. Thomas Kean told an audience at a Rutgers University conference yesterday that he thought it was “a shame” that fellow Republican Gov. Chris Christie pulled New Jersey out of the Regional
Greenhouse Gas Initiative. [The right and left debate RGGI in New Jersey].

From today’s NJ Spotlight‘s report on the climate-change conference:

Former Republican Gov. Thomas Kean is such a believer in climate change
that he is calling on informed citizens to “confront those who don’t
believe in the science of it for the ignorant people that they are.”

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie

Speaking before a Rutgers University conference in New Brunswick
Tuesday, Kean criticized fellow Republican Gov. Chris Christie, saying
it was a “shame” that he pulled New Jersey out of the Regional
Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

Christie’s decision to pull out of RGGI was highly controversial and
was especially disappointing to its backers, who hoped the regional
initiative would serve as a successful prototype for a national effort
to combat global climate change.

His decision also has been criticized
by Democrats in the legislature who have sought to enact bills to
maintain New Jersey’s participation in the program, most often without
any Republican backing.

When Christie announced his decision to withdraw from the program
this past summer, he conceded manmade activities were contributing to
global warming, but dismissed the regional initiative as ineffective and
merely a tax on consumers.

Former Gov. James Florio, however, said “we ought to be asking what it’s going to cost if we don’t do something.”

The state’s liberal political blog, Blue Jersey, which rarely misses an opportunity to criticize Mr. Christie, offered this perspective:

It is a sad measure of the lack of influence of Gov. Kean, a hugely
popular figure in New Jersey politics, on today’s Republican Party that
not one of the over 40 Republicans in the Legislature – who are led, in
part, by his son – will stand up to Christie the way that Kean did
yesterday.

As the event pointed out, it is ultimately our farmers, shore
communities, and tourism industry that will pay the price of state and
national inaction on climate change.

**If energy and environment issues are important to you, try a, free, 30-day trial subscription to our newsletter, EnviroPolitics. We carry dozens of stories, like the ones above, from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Delaware–and beyond–every business day. We also track all environmental legislation in NJ and PA–from introduction to enactment!**

Our most recent blog posts:
Anti-fracking bill clears NJ environmental committee
Need mulch? Give almost any town in North Jersey a call
Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today

Fracking foes celebrate a win but cannot declare victory
Fracking opponents plan big protest in Trenton today

Former NJ Gov. raps current NJ Gov. on RGGI pullout Read More »

Anti-fracking bill clears NJ environmental committee

“Politics is perception,” the chief lobbyist for the state’s chemical industry reminded members of
a legislative committee yesterday at the start of its hearing on A-4231, a bill to outlaw the storage or treatment of fracking wastewater in New Jersey.

And, for the ensuing 90 minutes, people on both
sides of the issue did their best to shape the public perception on hydrofracturing–the natural gas extraction technique more commonly known as fracking.

Hal Bozarth, executive director of the Chemistry Council of New Jersey, said that activists are using the legislation (and a separate bill banning fracking) to send a message to other states that New Jersey is opposed to fracking and, by extension he argued, to economic development.

How so? Because natural gas is a “building block” used by the chemical industry to create
a host of consumer products from computer parts and shampoo to toys and solar panels.

Many former manufacturers left the state, he said, when the cost of natural gas traded at
$14 per British thermal unit. The cost has dropped to $3 per Btu today, largely due to Marcellus Shale production, presenting New Jersey businesses, he said, with a significant raw material cost savings.

Bozarth argued that natural gas also promises to bring down New Jersey’s industrial energy rates which are 70 percent higher than the national average, while offering an environmentally cleaner alternative to coal in the production of that energy.

So much for shaping the positive perception.

On the negative side, fracking opponents, like Tracy Carluccio of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, asked why New Jersey would want to dispose of fracking wastewater in its waterways, claiming it is “ten times more toxic than waste water produced by gas drilling platforms.”

Up to 20 million gallons of it is produced daily in Pennsylvania, she said, and is being sent to Ohio where it is being disposed of in injection wells. DuPont, Carluccio said, is interested in treating fracking wastewater in New Jersey.

The Sierra Club‘s Jeff Tittel said: “We can’t handle the wastewater we currently have. Every time it rains, we have billions of gallons of partially treated sewage going out into our waters and streams.”

Tittel said that 50,000 gallons of wastewater escaped full treatment in Bergen County during Hurricane Irene, and asked: “What if that was fracking fluid?”

To avoid a possible interstate-commerce constitutional challenge, the bill was amended to remove a prohibition on transportation of fracking water into the state, presumably from Pennsylvania where fracking is being used to drill for natural gas in the Marcellus Shale or from New York where state regulators are getting closer to allowing such drilling.

The two Republican members of the five-member committee would not provide votes for the bill’s release, foreshadowing a tough battle ahead. The bill has virtually no chance of passing during the current lame-duck session but surely will be reintroduced when the Legislature reconvenes for a new two-year session in January.

You can listen to the entire hearing here.

Our most recent blog posts:
Need mulch? Give almost any town in North Jersey a call
Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today

Fracking foes celebrate a win but cannot declare victory
Fracking opponents plan big protest in Trenton today
After two outs before the NYPSC, Covanta back at bat

Anti-fracking bill clears NJ environmental committee Read More »

Need mulch? Give almost any town in North Jersey a call

The freak October storm that dropped a good amount of snow across northern New Jersey also dropped tons of trees and branches. So much so that Department of Public Works employees are piling up the overtime as they pick up, chip up, mulch up and pile up all the debris.

And they need to get it done soon, as the annual fall leaf collections already are coming in.

NBC New York’s Brian Thompson, who has a nose for such quirky environmental news, shows us just how big a job the North Jersey Mulchup is in the video below.

View more videos at: http://nbcnewyork.com.

Our most recent blog posts:
Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today

Fracking foes celebrate a win but cannot declare victory
Fracking opponents plan big protest in Trenton today
After two outs before the NYPSC, Covanta back at bat

William Spence is new CEO at Allentown, Pa-based PPL

Need mulch? Give almost any town in North Jersey a call Read More »

Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today

The New Jersey Assembly’s Environment and

Solid Waste Committee this afternoon will vote

on six energy and environmental bills, including

one that would prohibit the treatment of fracking

wastewater anywhere in New Jersey.

A-4231, sponsored by Assemblywoman Connie Wagner (D-Bergen) and Reed Gusciora

(D-Mercer), the bill would prohibit the shipping or transporting into, or treatment in

the State of wastewater from hydraulic fracturing (fracking). A companion measure, S-3049,

awaits action in the Senate Environment Committee.

The Legislature already has approved legislation that would ban the use of fracking, a

controversial natural gas-drilling technique, but Governor Chris Christie says he will not sign

the bill unless it is amended to apply for only one year. [Governor’s conditional veto message]

Although gas companies have shown no interest in drilling in New Jersey so far (the

Marcellus Shale formation lies under neighboring Pennsylvania and New York states)

environmentalists here have made fracking an the issue, calling on Gov. Christie to vote

against fracking rules [Fracking foes celebrate a win but cannot declare victory] proposed

by the regional Delaware River Basin Commission.

Other bills to be heard by the Environment and Solid Waste Committee today

at 2 p.m. in Committee Room 9 of the State House Annex in Trenton are:

A-1102 Coyle, D.M. (R-16)

Provides for priority consideration, by DCA, DEP, DOT,
and local government units, of permit applications for green building projects.

A-4267 Wagner, C. (D-38); Pietro, V. (D-32)

Allows counties and municipalities to use open space
trust funds for purchase of flood-prone properties. Related Bill: S-3078

A-4269 Wagner, C. (D-38)

“Emergency Transportation and Water Infrastructure
Recovery Bond Act of 2011;” authorizes bonds for $100,000,000. Related Bill: S-3099

A-4279 McKeon, J.F. (D-27); Chivukula, U.J. (D-17);
Benson, D.R. (D-14)

Increases renewable energy and energy efficiency
requirements under “Electric Discount and Energy Competition Act.” Related Bill: S-3032

A-4358 McKeon, J.F. (D-27)

Establishes forest harvest program on State-owned land.

Assembly Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee also meeting today.

The Agriculture committee, meeting at 2 p.m. in Room 8, plans to take up:

A-2770 Amodeo, J.F. (R-2); Albano, N.T. (D-1)

Transfers the Division of Fish and Wildlife (currently within the state Department of Environmental Protection to the Department of Agriculture.

A-3387 Riley, C.M. (D-3)

Expands number of salesrooms winery may operate from
six to seven and permits sampling of wine at salesrooms.

A-3388 Riley, C.M. (D-3)

Permits wineries to sell wine at certain farm markets.

AR-168 Albano, N.T. (D-1)

Urges USDA and other federal agencies to support State
efforts and fund solutions that reduce or eliminate the stink bug population.

Anti-fracking bill before NJ Assembly committee today Read More »