Credit: PennLive’s series on fracking “The Shale Bargain”

It seems like almost every day a new study or investigative report comes out of Pennsylvania’s Gaslands. They confirm what families have been saying for years- fracking is harming Pennsylvania communities and the government is failing to protect them.

Our Map of the Week comes from a new series by PennLive on fracking. ‘The Shale Bargain’ series is the result of a six-month long investigation that found the Department of Environmental Protection “relied heavily on energy companies to largely police themselves and, in the process, ignored citizens’ constitutional right to clean air and water.”

And what the maps show is just the beginning of what the fracking industry has planned for Pennsylvania. A new report from PennEnvironment found “that since the beginning of 2007, Pennsylvania has issued more than 19,300 permits for fracking wells,” and “by 2030, Pennsylvania could see up to 60,000 wells extracting resources from the Marcellus Shale alone.”

Knowing how much damage has already been done, it’s terrifying to imagine what that map would look like with 60,000 wells.

The Pennsylvania Government is on board with fracking overtaking the state and is more interested in protecting the industry than its citizens. Something we’re seeing in many fossil fuel extraction states.

But all over the country scientific evidence and public opposition is mounting against fracking. We wont stop until fracking is banned everywhere. Below are three powerful tools that you can use to share the truth about fracking with your community and elected officials.

Educate and activate your community:

Shalefield Stories -Volume 2: Shalefield Stories is a powerful compilation of first hand testimonies from people who have been harmed by dangerous drilling in the oil and gas shalefields across the US, many of whom are suffering in Pennsylvania’s Gaslands.

To get your copy of Shalefield Stories visit http://www.shalefieldstories.org

 Compendium of Scientific, Medical and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking, Third Edition: In easy to understand language, the Compendium summarizes hundreds of peer-reviewed studies on fracking. The Compendium covers numerous risks with sections on air pollution, water contamination, the threat of fracking infrastructure, climate change, worker safety and more.

View the Compendium: http://concernedhealthny.org/compendium/

GASWORK, The Fight for C.J.’s Law – GASWORK is a new short film by Josh Fox that investigates dangerous working conditions in the oil and gas fields.

Watch the film and take action at www.gasworkfilm.com and email screenings@gaslandthemovie.com to host a community screening

Thanks and have a great weekend,
Lee Ziesche, Grassroots Coordinator

If you have videos or maps you’d like us to share on our blog please email me at leeziesche@gmail.com

Our Map of the Week confirms widespread, systemic contamination of United States regulatory bodies by the oil and gas industry (and that water contamination due to fracking is widespread too!) Credit: BH/NY Friends of Clean Air and Water CC-BY-NC All other rights reserved

In a draft report 5 years in the making, the EPA has confirmed that fracking does indeed contaminate drinking water, a fact the oil and gas industry has vehemently denied.

But instead of dismantling the industry’s ‘not one single case of groundwater contamination caused by fracking’ refrain, the EPA decided to go with the misleading headline ‘there is no evidence fracking has led to widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water resources’.

It’s a puzzling conclusion since their study was conspicuously narrow (they did no new case studies, dropped three marquee cases that proved water contamination, and dropped all air quality studies from the report).

Our map of the week shows 313 cases where families reported water contamination due to drilling in just six counties in North Eastern, PA. Seems pretty widespread to me for a fracking and drilling campaign that’s still in its infancy. So far there’s been around 9,000 wells drilled in PA. One report showed the potential for 200,000 – 600,000 fracked wells in the state.

If the EPA is looking for proof of ‘widespread’ contamination before declaring fracking unsafe, they may not have to wait long. The industry’s own data shows that 5% of fracking wells leak upon drilling and that number only grows over time.

What the EPA presented to the public today was PR, not science and proof of the widespread, systemic contamination of our regulatory bodies by the oil and gas industry.

This isn’t the first time the EPA has released a report burying the science with a misleading headline that supports the Obama administration’s pro-fracking policies rather than reveal the true dangers of fracking. It’s a disturbing trend we reported on extensively in GASLAND Part II with cases in Dimock, Pennsylvania, Parker County, Texas and Pavilion, Wyoming.

In Dimock, Parker Country and Pavilion the EPA suddenly dropped water contamination cases when the science proved that fracking was the cause, going as far as slapping a press release claiming Dimock’s water was safe on a report that proved fracking had contaminated the water.

The EPA did this, conveniently, around the same time that President Obama was touting fracking as part of his All-of-the-Above energy policy on the campaign trail.

And President Obama has not backed off in his support for natural gas despite mounting evidence that fracking is a climate change disaster. His administration is opening up huge swaths of BLM land for drilling and has even gone so far as to allow fracking offshore in the Gulf of Mexico.

He’s not the only one. As Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton sold fracking to the rest of the world and has said nothing to indicate she will do any differently as President, despite claiming that addressing climate change is a pillar of her campaign.

If Barack and Hilary want to know what a fracking legacy looks like they should take a look at the pictures coming from Little Rock, Arkansas where a fracked-gas pipeline ruptured in the Arkansas River within view of Bill Clinton’s Presidential Library.

Millions of Americans know that fracking contaminates ground water and for the EPA to report any differently only proves that greatest contamination from the industry comes from its influence and ownership of our government.

It’s clear there is no action coming from our politicians to protect our public health and safety from fracking. They will stick with the industry till all our water is contaminated, our air polluted and climate change has made our planet unlivable.

It’s up to us to get the truth out.

If you want to educate your community on the dangers of fracking and the incredible influence of the industry on our government, email us to host a screening of GASLAND Part II at screenings@gaslandthemovie.com

Thanks,
Lee Ziesche, Grassroots Coordinator

P.S. If you have videos or maps you’d like us to share on our blog please email me at leeziesche@gmail.com

P.P.S Please consider chipping in so we can continue to share this vital information. Donate Here

On Monday, the Federal Energy Regulation Committee (FERC) approved the first east coast liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility in Cove Point, Maryland right on the Chesapeake Bay.

Despite massive citizen opposition to fracking, the oil and gas industry is trying to build these multi-billion dollar LNG ports all over the country so they can continue to frack the hell out of American families living above shale plays and make billions of dollars in profits shipping natural gas overseas. 

Now, more than ever, we need to come together to ban fracking.

If we let facilities like Cove Point and the 14 other proposed LNG ports be built, we are dooming families across the country to be fracked and we are solidifying the destruction of our planet through climate change. 

400,000 people took to the streets for the People’s Climate March to demand action. Thousands of them with signs reading messages similar to this “Fracking = Climate Change”.

The Global Frackdown is an important moment for us all to stand up and demand that we start developing renewable energy instead of continuing down the deadly fossil fuel path.

Please watch and share our video of the week: Join the Global Frackdown 

Thanks and have a great weekend,

Lee Ziesche, Gasland Grassroots Coordinator

Solutions Grassroots Trailer. Show coming to Brooklyn 9/21-9/26 from JFOX on Vimeo.

This summer we had two workshop performances of our newest project, The Solutions Grassroots Tour, in Callicoon and Oneonta, New York. These communities have fought hard against fracking and are ready to transition their towns from fossil fuels to 100% renewable energy.

We had packed houses for both shows, and the enthusiasm and commitment to developing democratic, renewable energy was awe inspiring. Now we want to share some of that experience with you.

Next, we’re bringing the show to Brooklyn right after the People’s Climate March when fractivists from all over the country will be in town.

THE SOLUTIONS GRASSROOTS TOUR
Directed by Josh Fox
Special premiere performance and fractivist after-party added after the People’s Climate March

September 21st – September 26th @ 7:30PM at the Irondale Theater
With guest hosts Mark Ruffalo, Debra Winger, Sandra Steingraber, Bill Mckibben, Zephyr Teachout, Peter Yarrow and Nahko Bear.

Get your tickets here.

The People’s Climate March is our chance to tell world’s leaders that we must act on climate change. We must end our deadly addiction to fossil fuels and transition to 100% renewable energy now.

As we continue to pressure our world leaders to take action, we must start taking action ourselves. The Solutions Grassroots tour is our chance to begin developing democratic, renewable energy on a community level.

We want to bring The Solutions Grassroots Tour to every community in the country that’s being threatened by fossil fuel development and climate change, and we’re working hard to make that happen.

Until we can share this incredible experience with you all in person, please watch and share our trailer, and join us in Brooklyn if you’ll be in town.

Thanks and have a great weekend,
Lee Ziesche, Gasland Grassroots Coordinator

The moment that stood out for me the most in today’s Video of the Week is a quick clip of an activist sign that says ‘Don’t Frack the Last Best Place’.

I think most people whose livelihoods are threaten by fracking feel that way.

There are reasons we chose to live where we do. It might be because the land has been in our family for generations. Or because we were drawn to the natural beauty of it. Or it felt like a safe place to raise a family.

Fracking threatens all of that.

We’ve heard many families besieged by oil and gas development say they don’t even know where they would go if they left their homes. With fracking going on in 34 states there is no safe place.

When we look at the big picture and climate change, more last best places get put on the chopping block. The entire fracking process from production to delivery is fraught with fugitive methane emissions, a potent green house gas that will exacerbate global warming.

Fracking and other forms of extreme energy development threaten to take the last best place from all of us.

But as the video points out, there is one defense that can save our last best places. It’s grassroots democracy. It’s you

Please watch and share our video of the week by the Norther Plains Resource Council.

Thanks and have a great weekend,
Lee Ziesche, Gasland Grassroots Coordinator

Northern Plains Resource Council is a grassroots conservation group that organizes Montana’s citizens to protect our water quality, family farms and ranches, and unique quality of life. That’s why Northern Plains is engaging our members to build a statewide network that empowers communities to guide development.

As they stand today, Montana’s rules and regulatory bodies are simply not up to the task of protecting our water, air, soil, communities, or landowner rights from the dangers of extreme oil and gas development. Our state standards lag behind those in neighboring states and even industry standards. The Montana Board of Oil and Gas Conservation (BOGC) is particularly unresponsive to the concerns of citizens and landowners that are outside of the “good ‘ol boys club” of oil and gas companies.

What are we doing to change the oil and gas landscape in Montana? Check out Northern Plains’ website to learn more about our three core campaigns:

-Developing and advocating for regulations based on best management practices that will force the oil and gas industry to do it right. We want to pass landowner protections that improve transparency, oversight and accountability.

-Pressuring the Board of Oil and Gas Conservation for reforms—including a lawsuit over their 48-hour fracking notification rule for wildcat wells, and the right for public participation in the permitting process.

-Organizing to ensure the Montana State Water Plan accounts for oil and gas water quality and quantity impacts and limits the shifting use of water to the oil and gas industry.

-Using Citizen Initiated Zoning and Conservation District ordinance campaigns to create local controls that put the power to guide development back in the hands of the people.

To win on this issue, we need your help. Join Northern Plains Resource Council today! As a grassroots member-run organization, Northern Plains is built on the involvement and support of our members. Will you join us?

Get our Video of the Week straight to your inbox. Sign up for updates at www.gaslandthemovie.com

THE SKY IS PINK by Josh Fox and the GASLAND Team from JFOX on Vimeo.

The scientific evidence proving that fracking is a threat to our health, environment and communities is overwhelming.

Study after study supports the reporting in both GASLAND films. We are extremely honored and happy to announce that GASLAND PART II was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Research.

That’s basically the highest recognition you can get in TV news and documentary for knowing your facts.

But the oil and gas industry still denies there’s a problem.

Our Video of the Week: The Sky is Pink shows the extreme lengths the industry has gone to in order to deceive the public and deny the truth.

The Concerned Health Professionals of New York just released a compendium that compiles a significant body of scientific, medical and journalistic findings proving the dangers of fracking.

From studies on air pollution and water contamination to increased earthquakes and crime rates the evidence is damning. There is no safe fracking.

Instead of taking responsibility, the industry denies the evidence and tries to discredit anyone who stands up against them. They throw around words like hoax and debunked, and hope no one takes a real look at the scientific facts.

The industry is powerful and spends a lot of money on misinformation, but we have you.

Please help us share the truth. Watch and share our video of the week.

You can also buy or rent Gasland Part II on Amazon or iTunes. 

Thanks and have a great weekend.

Lee Ziesche, Gasland Grassroots Coordinator

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On Memorial Day, fractivists in Illinois headed to their state capital to fight for democracy.

A bit of background- on the Friday before Memorial Day Weekend, the Illinois House Executive Committee voted to pass a measure that would fast-track fracking in Illinois, allowing fracking in the state before the Illinois Department of Natural Resources finished the rule making process.

The measure would circumvent democracy, ignoring 36,000 public comments the IDNR received on the state’s proposed fracking rules and create a fracking sacrifice zone in Southern Illinois. 

A hearing on the legislation was set for Monday, Memorial Day. Despite the clear attempt to cut the people of Illinois out of the process, citizens showed up, demanding that their voices be heard.

Community groups attending the hearing included Illinois People’s Action, SAFE, IIRON student network, The People’s Lobby and Sierra Club of Illinois.

The legislation died, failing to get enough support to pass. And as Illinois People’s Action say in the video

“Oil and Gas tried to fast track fracking, but the people fought back and won thus proving once again that organizing works!”

Keep organizing. It works.

- Lee Ziesche, Gasland Grassroots Coordinator

Our video of the week features an incredible fractivist from Pennsylvania forcing her state’s politicians to face the truth about fracking.

During a PA Democratic Gubernatorial Debate, Liz Arnold took a stand when she realized the critical issue of fracking wasn’t even going to be discussed.

By standing up and speaking out, Liz forced the media to talk about fracking in their coverage of the debate and drew attention to the candidates’ weak stances on fracking.

Below is Liz’s statement.

The Death Cycle of Fracking

Written by Elizabeth Arnold

I’m not particularly brave, I just feel that there is nothing anyone could do to me worse than what they are doing to our planet and to the families who can no longer live in their homes. When I rushed the stage I held up a list of 1700 families impacted by fracking. The List of the Harmed is compiled by Jenny Lysak and is now up to over 6,000 families. My printer stopped printing at 1700.

I actually hate the spotlight, but someone had to do it. I could not sit by and let this critical issue go unaddressed. About half way through the ‘debate’ I realized they were not even going to discuss fracking. I was sitting in the front row, very close to the stage steps. I had heard the candidates use the phrase “haven’t answered the tough questions” repeatedly and suddenly I just bolted on to stage without realizing the notes I had been scribbling were still in my left hand. I blanked on everything I was going to say and just winged it. Only later when watching the video did I hear what words actually came out of my mouth. There are many things I wish I had said, but hopefully my ‘inappropriate behavior’ creates some real discussion on a subject the candidates avoid like the plague, while we live the scourge.

The female moderator was beaming at me while the candidates just held fake smiles. But they are use to it. I’ve been bird-dogging them since November. They must have seen it coming. Security didn’t seem too threatened by me. One of the guards who hauled me out commended me saying “Great job.”

They weren’t sure what to do with me, but since I wouldn’t stop talking about children waking up with nose-bleeds, people passing out from the fumes while taking a shower, families being told not to light their stoves because their houses may explode, families living without water three years later — they just wanted me to leave before I depressed them further.

Then I walked out into the spring air and talked to supporters. I spoke with Craig Stevens, who also got thrown out for speaking up after they hauled me out.

Craig is a 6th generation landowner from Northeast PA. He is a lifelong conservative Tea Party Republican. He leased his land and has a pipeline running through his backyard. He now spends a lot of time visiting the offices of politicians all over the country to tell them how horrible fracking is and why we need to ban it.

He is considering voting Democrat for the first time in his life, because of our horrible Gov. Corbett. Unfortunately the Democrats are not much better on this issue (everyone is, of course, better than Corbett!)

I have seen the anti-fracking movement grow exponentially in Pennsylvania over the past four years. Public opinion has become more anti-fracking in PA as people learn about the practice, and as more people are directly impacted by the death-cycle of fracking. Yet there has been little discussion in the media or in political offices about whether this practice should be permitted and how we can ensure Pennsylvanians are safe and prosperous.

If fracking could be done safely (which has yet to be proven), then we would need to insure that the state benefits, which it has not. When they first started fracking PA heavily back in 2007/2008, many thought it could be done safely if tightly regulated. The NE PA group ‘Responsible Drilling Alliance’ is now just ‘RDA’ and has dropped the underlying meaning, because they have decided there is no such thing as responsible drilling. We haven’t seen it anywhere in the country.

Fracking is more than just the drill pad. It requires noxious loud compressor stations, pipelines, water withdraw facilities, endless 24/7 truck traffic on roads still often used by horse and buggy, fracking waste dumped in the middle of the night (or in plain sight on the roads as ‘de-icer,’ which eats away at the underside of cars), mining the bluffs of the Mississippi for sand, workers developing silicosis, chemical production for the toxic frack fluid cocktail, injection wells to get rid of the millions of gallons of contaminated radioactive water that flowbacks with the gas when a well is fracked. And now they are trying to permit Liquid Natural Gas export facilities, which is a dangerous, harmful process that would allow all our gas to be shipped overseas.

We are not asking for much, just a chance for PA to protect our long-term economic and environmental health. No one should live without clean drinking water and a safe environment. No part of PA should be a for-profit sacrifice zone. It’s about time the well-being of all Pennsylvanians is addressed in public forums where candidates give clear and precise answers on how they will advance the common good. Don’t be shy about demanding action.

Elizabeth Arnold is an electrician by day and activist by night. She lives in Philadelphia and has been organizing with amazing activists from across PA since the Bush-era. Together they are organizing for the long haul. They are starting a campaign house in NE PA where youth can spend their summers learning and working in communities directly impacted by fracking. She is a proud MoveOn.org#FrackingFighter.

Our Video of the Week is only about a minute long, but it says a lot.

Activists in Virginia have been fighting to keep fracking out of the George Washington National Forest only to have a train full of fracked Bakken oil derail and explode in Lynchburg, leaking crude oil into the James River, part of that crucial watershed.

This is not an isolated incident. Unfortunately it often takes a train or a well pad engulfed in flames to garner media attention, but from well casing failures and spills to truck accidents and pipeline explosions, this process is fatally flawed from start to finish.

The industry tries to limit the definition of fracking to what happens under the ground, but we know it’s a full cycle of exploitation, from onsite contamination to dangerous transportation and waste disposal consequences.

We can’t let the industry isolate these incidents and the communities they effect.

That’s why we feel compelled to show this devastating video of the week, to show that North Dakota and Lynchburg, Virginia aren’t far away when it comes to fracking.

Below is a great piece by Steve Horn for DeSmogBlog that not only connects the dots between Lynchburg and North Dakota, but also shows the connections to potential exports and the Keystone XL pipeline.

Explosive Virginia Train Carried Fracked Bakken Oil, Headed to Potential Export Facility (via Desmogblog)

Wed, 2014-04-30 21:55Steve Horn Platts confirmed CSX Corporation’s train that exploded in Lynchburg, Virginia was carrying sweet crude obtained via hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) in North Dakota’s Bakken Shale basin. CSX CEO Michael Ward…

Our video of the week is Josh’s special appearance on All in With Chris Hayes on MSNBC on Earth Day. Josh’s segment begins around 9:55.

During the interview Josh asks, “What’s money worth when there is no civilization?”

The anti-fracking movement knows the answer to this question better than anyone.

We prove that civilization and community is worth more than money every single day. We come together to help fight for not only our own health, safety and environment, but the health, safety and environment of our neighbors next door to us and those half way around the world.

We do this every day, not just Earth Day. 

Seeing the anti-fracking community in action gives us faith and motivation that we the people can bring about the change necessary to move our country to 100% renewable energy.

We’re not going to wait around until it’s profitable for Exxon Mobil and Shell to start worrying about climate change. 

We are doing it now. And we’re doing in a democratic, community-oriented way.

I hope you had a lovely Earth Day and have a great weekend.

-Lee Ziesche, Gasland Grassroots Coordinator.