McKinsey & Company:

Growing competition for scarce water resources is a growing business risk, a major economic threat, and a challenge for the sustainability of communities and the ecosystems upon which they rely. It is an issue that has serious implications for the stability of countries in which businesses operate, and for industries whose value chains are exposed to water scarcity.

Charting our water future: Economic frameworks to inform decision-making shows that while meeting competing demands for water will be a considerable challenge, it is entirely possible to close the growing gap between water supply and demand. This report provides greater clarity on the scale of the water challenge and how it can be met in an affordable and sustainable manner.

The report offers case studies from four countries with drastically different water issues, which will collectively account for 40 percent of the world’s population, 30 percent of global GDP and 42 percent of projected water demand in 2030: China, India, South Africa and Brazil. The report’s methodology identifies supply- and demand-side measures that could constitute a more cost effective approach to closing the water gap and achieve savings in each country.

Charting_Our_Water_Future_Full_Report_001 –

The wonders of clean natural gas:

“The water is so saturated with methane and other chemicals it is not to be used for human consumption,” said Bernice Angely, who’s had water trucked to her home 10 miles west of town since her well blew up in July 2007.

Petroglyph Energy Inc., a Boise, Idaho-based firm that has worked the rolling plains of the Raton Basin since 1999, suspended drilling until it can stem the methane. Colorado also is rewriting rules that had allowed Petroglyph to discharge water runoff from its drilling into streams and creeks.

Somebody is going to have to pay for that, right?

But Petroglyph says it’s not clear the drilling caused the methane leaks or prompted other area water wells to run dry. Eying what it calls an extremely promising natural gas field, it believes a shallow water formation tapped by area homeowners isn’t connected to a deeper one pumped by the company for its drilling operations.

Petroglyph chief operating officer Paul Powell also believes a growing number of new homes in the area could explain some of the dry water wells.

“We’ll do what we need to do,” Powell said, stressing that his firm is working with the state on a solution.

With a little luck the people of NYC won’t face the same fate.

(H/T Raw Story)

KTVU:

A mile-long sheen of bunker fuel oil drifted from a tanker anchored in the still waters of the San Francisco Bay Friday, triggering an emergency response by the U.S. Coast Guard, authorities said.

A Coast Guard spokesman said the agency got a report at around 8 a.m. reporting the sheen of drifting oil and tarballs streaming from the rear of Panamanian registered tanker Dubai Star that was anchored 2 1/1 miles south of the Bay Bridge.

Petty Officer 3rd Class Melissa Lee said a massive response was under way.

“The leak occurred when they were transferring bunker fuel (from a barge to the tanker),” she said. “We are evaluating the situation and have resources responding. “

Friends of the Earth has a petition calling for the use of bunker fuel to be discontinued:

Bunker fuel is a toxic, asphalt-like substance that is causing air pollution and global warming, harming marine life, and damaging human health and the environment. I join with Friends of the Earth in calling on Congress to require the cruise and shipping industries to end their use of this dirty fuel and transition to cleaner alternatives.

Friends of the Earth and Clean Air Task Force submit the following written testimony to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee last year:

Press release from the EPA.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is launching this year a comprehensive new evaluation of the pesticide atrazine to determine its effects on humans. At the end of this process, the agency will decide whether to revise its current risk assessment of the pesticide and whether new restrictions are necessary to better protect public health. One of the most widely used agricultural pesticides in the U.S., atrazine can be applied before and after planting to control broadleaf and grassy weeds. EPA will evaluate the pesticide’s potential cancer and non-cancer effects on humans. Included in this new evaluation will be the most recent studies on atrazine and its potential association with birth defects, low birth weight, and premature births.

“One of Administrator Jackson’s top priorities is to improve the way EPA manages and assesses the risk of chemicals, including pesticides, and as part of that effort, we are taking a hard look at the decision made by the previous administration on atrazine,” said Steve Owens, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances. “Our examination of atrazine will be based on transparency and sound science, including independent scientific peer review, and will help determine whether a change in EPA’s regulatory position on this pesticide is appropriate.”

During the new evaluation, EPA will consider the potential for atrazine cancer and non-cancer effects, and will include data generated since 2003 from laboratory and population studies. To be certain that the best science possible is used in its atrazine human health risk assessment and ensure transparency, EPA will seek advice from the independent Scientific Advisory Panel (SAP) established under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act.

EPA will engage the SAP to evaluate the human health effects of atrazine over the coming year. Below is the timeline:

· November 2009: EPA will present SAP its plan for the new atrazine evaluation.
· February 2010: EPA will present and seek scientific peer review of its proposed plan for incorporating population studies into the atrazine risk assessment.
· April 2010: EPA will present and seek peer review of its evaluation of atrazine non-cancer effects based on animal laboratory toxicology studies, selection of safety factors in the risk assessment, and the sampling design currently used to monitor drinking water in community water systems.
· September 2010: EPA will present and seek peer review of its evaluation of atrazine cancer and non-cancer effects based on animal toxicology studies and epidemiology studies. This review is intended to include the most recent results from the National Cancer Institute’s Agricultural Health Study, anticipated for publication in 2010.

At the conclusion of this process, EPA will ask the SAP to review atrazine’s potential effects on amphibians and aquatic ecosystems. The SAP meetings will be open to the public.

In addition to the scientific review of the effects of atrazine, EPA plans to meet with interested groups to explore better ways to inform the public more quickly about results of atrazine drinking water monitoring.

This piece was originally published by ProPublica. It has been republished here with permission. Learn more about ProPublica.

Figure 5-3, ‘Sample Fracture Fluid Composition by Weight’, as seen in the draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement on natural gas drilling by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Division of Mineral Resources

Two prominent gas industry executives have directly addressed one of the key environmental concerns surrounding the expansion of natural gas development by calling for the disclosure of chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing.

The statements – made last week by Chesapeake Energy CEO Aubrey McClendon and Range Resources CEO John Pinkerton – came as the industry faces increasing pressure to be more forthcoming about the chemicals it uses. New York State recently released an environmental impact statement that specifically called for disclosure of the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing. Colorado and several other states also have asked for that information.

At issue is whether hydraulic fracturing, and the chemicals it requires, might be responsible for water contamination incidents in drilling areas across the country. The process, which is currently exempt from federal oversight under the Safe Drinking Water Act, forces millions of gallons of water, mixed with sand and small amounts of chemicals, into the earth to break rock and release gas. Scientists, including some at the Environmental Protection Agency, have said they can’t thoroughly investigate the contamination incidents because the names of the chemicals are protected trade secrets.

At a panel discussion at the IHS Herold Pacesetters Energy Conference in Greenwich, Conn., McClendon told attendees that fracturing should be demystified, and that “we need to disclose the chemicals that we are using and search for alternatives,” according to an account of the discussion from Reuters. In other news reports, McClendon was quoted as saying he was concerned that undue fears about the drilling chemicals had bogged down efforts to open the Marcellus Shale, a mammoth natural gas deposit that lies beneath much of Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York.

Chesapeake and other gas producers subcontract fracturing services from companies that specialize in the process, including Halliburton, Schlumberger and BJ Services. In the past, those companies have said they are differentiated by the recipes they use for fracturing underground and that forced disclosure would erase any competitive advantage. But a Schlumberger spokesperson was recently quoted as saying the company is willing to discuss more disclosure.

At the energy conference, Pinkerton called the companies’ concerns that disclosure would put them at a disadvantage “silly” and said, according to a report in Natural Gas Intelligence, that “I’ve basically told them that this is not acceptable.”

Chesapeake and several gas industry associations already offer the public educational fact sheets that  detail a few dominant ingredients in fracturing solutions, but the fact sheets don’t list all the ingredients or explain how they might be combined, information that environmental scientists say is critical to measuring the risk associated with fracturing fluids. It isn’t clear how much more McClendon and Pinkerton would favor disclosing.

“The question remains, what is that disclosure going to be?” said Amy Mall, a policy analyst for the Natural Resources Defense Council. “Is it going to be specifics that allow a health specialist or a hydrologist to analyze exactly what the risks are to human health? The devil is in the details.”

A Chesapeake spokesman declined to clarify McClendon’s statements, but in an e-mailed response said “the discussion about the types of additives used in minimal amounts during hydraulic fracturing is misguided since each additive that is brought onto a well location is accompanied by a Materials Safety Data Sheet, which not only identifies the materials but outlines proper ways in which to utilize them.” The MSDS sheets, which are available to the public, are required by law to provide information on how workers might be poisoned by chemicals – but they’ve also been criticized as providing only partial information.

Pinkerton, the Range Resources CEO, also declined to comment for this article, but a company spokesman said Pinkerton would like to see more information made public than is currently available. “We need to go further than where we have been so far,” said the spokesman, Matt Pitzarella. “We need to get it to a level where everyone is comfortable. In recent years, more and more of those chemicals are now organically based, and I think we need to get a movement towards more and more organically based chemicals.”

It remains to be seen whether service providers such as Halliburton, and the chemical manufactures that supply them, will go along with a movement towards disclosure, as they are the ones with the most at stake. Neither Halliburton nor Schlumberger responded to requests for comment.

“When you start getting from the general to the specific, people may have considerations that aren’t reflected in those general statements,” said Fuller, the Independent Petroleum Association of America spokesman. “We’ve been having conversations with our members about chemical disclosure and types of disclosure and proprietary information for months if not longer.”

A series of reports from ProPublica in the past year have documented numerous cases in which gas drilling and the handling of the fluids it requires have led to water contamination. In response to those concerns, New York State put a moratorium on new drilling in the prized Marcellus Shale gas deposit, and hydraulic fracturing has become a hot button issue across the country.

Political pressure has also been building.

The day before the two executives spoke in Connecticut, a bipartisan group of senators urged their colleagues to include a study of the environmental impacts of fracturing in the energy and climate bill being considered by Congress.

In June, members of the House and Senate also weighed in on the subject, introducing twin bills that would give the EPA authority to regulate fracturing under the Safe Drinking Water Act and mandate disclosure of the chemicals used in the fracturing process. The energy industry is fighting the legislation, known as the Frack Act, and it has languished since summer.

Gwen Lachelt, director of the Oil and Gas Accountability Project, an environmental advocacy group based in Durango, Colo., thinks the executives’ statements show how eager they are to put environmental controversies behind them.

“There is a lot of horse trading going on right now,” Lachelt said. “I don’t think it’s any coincidence that we are hearing from companies about their willingness to disclose and the timing of this letter from the senators.”

Lee Fuller, vice president of government affairs for the Independent Petroleum Association of America, said that if a study of fracturing is included in the climate bill, it would “diminish any interest in moving forward on the Frack Act.”

Not so, said Kristofer Eisenla, deputy chief of staff for one of the bill’s main sponsors, Congresswoman Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), who supports both the study and the disclosure but would also like to see a regulatory framework for addressing the fracturing process.

“Just because they are coming around to see the light of day on this and starting to agree with us doesn’t mean we are going to fold up and go home,” he said. “It does validate what we are trying to do here.”

Pro Publica:

A long-anticipated draft environmental review laying out proposed laws for natural gas drilling in New York’s Marcellus Shale has been released by the state after 18 months of study and several delays. State officials say the guidelines, which are 809 pages long and extremely detailed, address key concerns, including the disclosure of fluids used in the drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing and the on-site handling of drilling waste.

But according to a summary that accompanied the document, which was released just before 6 p.m. Wednesday, it would not ban drilling inside the New York City watershed, a central Catskill Mountain area that supplies drinking water to 9 million people.

“The state’s mitigation proposals are half measures,” Manhattan borough president Scott Stringer said in a news release Wednesday night. “I believe the choice is simple: we either correct this error and ban drilling now, or soon enough the officials entrusted with protecting our environment will be asked to explain why they were asleep at the switch when it mattered most.”

Here is the introduction:

ogdsgeischap1 –

Here is the full document:

OGdSGEISFull –

This piece was originally published by DC Bureau. It has been republished here with permission. Learn more about DC Bureau.

Part I of Fish and Paint Chips, The Science of Trash, can be found here.

According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and other public information, the referendum was backed primarily by the American Chemistry Council (ACC), the plastics industry trade association, and the 7-11 chain of convenience stores. The ACC made local headlines with its all-out summer media blitz to promote the referendum, ultimately spending $1.4 million before the vote was held. In comparison, the Seattle Green Bag Campaign to support the fee raised less than $100,000.

In a press release trumpeting its victory, the ACC argued that whatever its environmental implications, plastic is good for the economy. The release repeated a common industry argument: recycling, not outright reduction, should be the centerpiece of any plastics policy. “[R]ecycling legislation in New York, California, Rhode Island, Delaware and cities across the country is expected to increase significantly the amount of plastic bags and wraps that are turned into new consumer products, such as durable decking, fencing, railings, shopping carts and new bags,” it stated. Indeed, the industry has long argued that if consumers recycle and reuse enough plastic, less of it enters the waste stream, so there is little need to rethink manufacturing strategies. The ACC’s PlasticBagFacts.org Web site repeats the argument: “Banning recyclable plastic bags will not solve the litter problem or reduce the amount of waste in our sewers and landfills. Litter must be addressed directly by targeting behavior and increasing access to recycling bins and waste receptacles.” Nowhere at the “Taxes And Bans Don’t Work” link is there a discussion of cutting unneeded plastic production in the first place. Nor is plastic the only interested party. Considering the seafood industry’s current scope ─ $55 billion a year, according to the 2009 International Association of Culinary Professionals award-winning book Bottomfeeder ─ it’s hard to imagine today’s legion of commercial fishing outfits, seafood restaurant chains and other players quietly giving up and going home, even if upcoming studies establish a link from seaborne toxics to humans. To take just one example, while the Red Lobster franchise is hardly the source of the problem, it has done little to educate consumers: the restaurant’s Web site has a link to a “Seafood & Health” page, but it consists only of recipe recommendations and a nutrition calculator designed to tout the benefits of fatty acids and other features of a seafood diet.

One of the problems with any political effort to reduce waste is that science, unlike campaign money, is often not directed at a specific outcome. Marcus Eriksen of the Algalita Foundation said that when it comes to studying the world’s pollution gyres, even groups that agree about the outlines of the problem often don’t see eye to eye on how to handle or study it. “When any issue becomes pop science, as ocean pollution is now, you get competition to be the go-to expert on the issue,” he said, pointing to his own group, NOAA and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego as only the biggest of many figures in the field. But that friendly rivalry, he said, shouldn’t stand in the way of the greater good: “I’d love to see others doing more trawls, getting more data. [NOAA and Scripps] have only gone to the same gyre we have for the last 10 years” ─ the one located in the North Pacific ─ “and the question now is, what’s the global picture?” Without that kind of picture, it will be difficult to convince other governments, whether local or national, that their communities are contributing to the problem.

The ACC, for its part, argues that when it comes to tackling solid waste, plastic is the wrong focus. “Clearly, if you ban a plastic product, you’re going to have less of that plastic product,” said Keith Christman, senior director of market advocacy for the ACC’s Plastics Division. “That’s not really the question. The question is whether you have less total waste.” He suggested that localized bag bans or fees have no effect on pollution because the constant demand for bags means that consumers will find them one way or another. He pointed to an April 2008 garbage audit performed by a contractor for the city of San Francisco, where non-compostable plastic checkout bags have been banned at most stores since late 2007, that found retail bags as a percentage of total street litter had not decreased over the following twelve months. (Litter had, however, decreased overall by 17 percent.) He dismissed as ineffective Ireland’s 15 euro-cent bag fee, implemented in 2002, which a February 21, 2007, Reuters article said had reduced plastic bag litter by 95 percent. The article quoted environment minister Dick Roche as saying that the number of bags used by shoppers dropped from 328 per person before the fee to “as low 21 per head each year,” largely because shoppers had switched to reusable bags.

In broad terms, Christman’s message was consistent: “Litter is a problem bigger than any one entity.” He stressed ACC’s partnerships with retail stores to implement voluntary recycling measures under the aegis of its Keep America Beautiful program, and correctly pointed out that environmental impact studies suggest paper bags, because of their carbon dioxide implications, are not always a sound alternative to plastic. (Plastic “consumes 40 to 70 percent less energy to manufacture, generates 80 percent less solid waste, and produces 60 percent fewer atmospheric emissions,” according to the newest edition of the consumer product magazine Utne Reader.) However, canvas and even polyester bags, which are increasing in popularity, are much less harmful over time than paper or plastic, a point studiously ignored by a late 2007 report commissioned by the ACC’s Progressive Bag Alliance titled Life Cycle Assessment for Three Types of Grocery Bags, which includes a telling caveat: “This study did not examine the impacts associated with reusable cloth bags, so no comparison was made between the cloth bags and single-use polyethylene plastic bags. In other studies, however, cloth bags were shown to reduce environmental impacts if consumers can be convinced to switch.”

Read the rest of this entry »

I previously mentioned that the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection had ordered Cabot Oil and Gas to stop drilling in Susquehanna County. Cabot Oil and Gas has now responded:

Cabot Oil & Gas Corporation (NYSE: COG) today reported on its remediation of three frac fluid releases at its Heitsman 4H Well location in Dimock Township, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. As reported to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP), on September 16, 2009 during fracing operations being performed by Cabot contractors, Baker Corporation and Halliburton, there were two releases of frac fluid for a total of approximately 7980 gallons, some of which entered Steven’s Creek. The frac fluid is 99.5% fresh water and 0.5% gel. This mixture is not hazardous or dangerous.

Cabot has determined these releases were caused by failed piping connections between the frac tanks holding a fresh water supply and the equipment used to pump the fluid into the shale formation located more than a mile underground. Also as reported to the PADEP, on September 22, 2009 a release of frac fluid occurred on the same location of approximately 420 gallons. Cabot has determined this release was caused by a pressure surge which caused a hose to rupture.

After each event, and in conjunction with the PADEP, Cabot immediately mobilized a crew to pump the released fluid into on-site storage tanks and clean up any remaining fluid. Water and sediment samples were taken by Cabot at Steven’s Creek, after flushing operations, on September 17, 2009 and again on September 22, 2009. Results obtained to date confirm that remediation efforts have been successful. Dan O. Dinges, Chairman, President and CEO of Cabot, stated “Cabot has a zero tolerance for releases on Cabot properties, and takes its obligations very seriously in this regard. I am pleased with the remediation at the Heitsman 4H location, have been advised that minimal impact resulted from the initial spill containment measures, and there is no further impact to the environment as a result of the releases.”

Cabot is working with Halliburton and Baker to fully determine the cause of the releases and the appropriate additional measures to prevent reoccurrence in the future. Despite Cabot’s positive working relationship with the PADEP field personnel with whom Cabot interacts on a daily basis, Cabot received an Order from the Environmental Program Manager, Oil and Gas Management of the PADEP, located in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, to temporarily cease all hydraulic-fracturing/well stimulation operations in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania until there is a full review of the incidents.

Dinges stated, “Cabot is disappointed by the PADEP’s issuance of this Order. Based on the facts as we know them, we disagree with several of the allegations made in the Order. However, Cabot is fully committed to understanding the cause of these releases, improving our contractor’s procedures and to the timely resumption of our fracing operations, all of which we will communicate to the market as new information becomes available. This Order has no impact on our drilling which will continue as planned, and there will be no disruption to existing production.”

This piece was originally published by ProPublica. It has been republished here with permission. Learn more about ProPublica.

After three chemical spills in the past nine days, and following a history of environmental problems over the last year, Pennsylvania officials have ordered Cabot Oil and Gas, one of the most active natural gas companies in the state, to stop its hydraulic fracturing operations in Susquehanna County pending an intensive review.

“The department took this action because of our concern about Cabot’s current fracking process and to ensure that the environment in Susquehanna County is properly protected,” DEP north central regional Director Robert Yowell said in a news release distributed this morning.

The stop-work order, which was accompanied by new citations issued for the third spill, will interrupt development of seven new wells that Cabot is currently drilling, and intending to fracture, in Susquehanna County. The citations were similar to those levied earlier in the week, including a failure to contain fracturing fluids.

The state’s order gives Cabot two weeks to re-submit an “accurate” Pollution Prevention and Contingency Plan and Control and Disposal Plan for its well pad sites in the county. It gives the company three weeks to complete an engineering study of the equipment and practices used for hydraulic fracturing.

“There were unique elements of the location that experienced the three incidents and it was not necessary to force a shutdown of all fracturing activities,” said Cabot Spokesman Ken Komoroski, explaining that fluids were piped further than usual at the well site in question. “However Cabot understand the department has an important job to do.”

In interviews earlier this week, Komoroski underscored that the spills had happened under the watch of two of its contractors: Halliburton, one of the world’s largest drilling service companies, and Baker Tanks, a tank transport company.

In recognition of those circumstances, Pennsylvania will require Cabot to post its new pollution prevention plan at each well site and make it available to all its contractors, something that is not normally required in the state.

Here is the press release:

dep_cabot_order_090925 –

Mudflats:

It’s always nice when a poll backs up what you know, and proves that there are still things out there that aren’t even close. Nor should they be. What we found out today is that the residents of the Bristol Bay watershed don’t want the Pebble Mine. They think that clean water, and wild fish, and jobs that already exist, and subsistence are actually more important than the risk of mining.Read the press release below and you will understand why Pebble Mine is a deal breaker for many voters. Anyone running for office in 2010 needs to pay close attention before they sell Bristol Bay down the river in favor of foreign mining interests.

Background information on the proposed Pebble Mine development is available here.

NunamtaSurveyPressRelease –

Here is a letter local community residents sent on Monday to Cynthia Carroll, CEO of Anglo American, the company which has proposed to develop the Pebble Mine.

CynthiaCarrollLtr20090921 –