No One Is Counting the Trucks in N. WV and SW. PA
Two Injured In Wetzel County Crash on July 28th
From Lauren Matthews, Wetzel Chronicle, July 30, 2014
Chief Deputy Mike Koontz of the Wetzel County Sheriff’s Department confirmed that a citation was issued in an accident that occurred Monday involving a tractor-trailer.
Koontz stated the wreck occurred at approximately 3:05 p.m. when the tractor trailer transporting drilling materials was headed west on state Route 7 near the Wetzel County 4-H grounds. Koontz said that the tractor trailer crossed over the center line at a sharp turn and collided head-on with a Ford F-150 pickup truck, which had two occupants.
Koontz stated the two occupants of the pick-up truck were transported to Wetzel County Hospital for treatment to injuries and were later released. The driver of the tractor trailer was not injured, but was issued a citation.
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An article in a recent issue of Science, the journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, links the recent Oklahoma earthquakes to unconventional drilling waste water disposal. The largest was magnitude 5.7.
The USGS defines this effect as on the line between “felt by all, many frightened, some heavy furniture moved; a few instances of fallen plaster, damage slight” and “damage negligible in buildings of good design and construction; slight to moderate in well-built ordinary structures; considerable damage in poorly built or badly designed structures; some chimneys broken.”
Most have been in the range of magnitude 2 or 3, “not felt except by a very few under especially favorable conditions.” These are readily detected by instruments, however.
These earthquakes are caused by displacement of strata by the huge pressures used to force the water into the earth. The evidence is timing with peak pumping, location of the quakes bear the disposal wells, and sudden increase in earthquakes when waste disposal began a few years ago . One was 22 miles away from the injection well.
Interesting fact from the article: It takes 200 times as much water to produce a barrel of oil by unconventional wells as by conventional ones. It would be good to know how unconventional gas wells compare with older wells here in the Marcellus!
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An article in the Wisconsin Gazette starts: “Federal and state subsidies for fossil fuels in the United States tops $37 billion a year, according to a new report from Oil Change International.”
Of course, this counts subsidies directly from governments, and does not count forced subsidies from people compelled to donate their land and water to the industry, their health, comfort, convenience and esthetic values, the public expense of repairing roads, additional cost to maintaining court house record rooms and additional law enforcement due to drilling, nor the probability wells that won’t get plugged and will be left open forever, or paid for at public expense, long after they are exhausted. All those “externalized” costs, left for someone else to pay.
Anther line in that article reads: “Much of the increase in the value of fossil fuel production subsidies can be attributed to the increase in oil and gas production in recent years, according to OCI. Federal fossil fuel production and exploration subsidies, for example, have grown in value by 45 percent since President Barack Obama took office in 2009.” Also “The organization credited the Obama administration with attempts to reduce subsidies and criticized Congress for stymying those efforts.” Further: “The report notes that in 2011-12, the fossil fuels industry spent $329 million in campaign finance contributions and received $33 billion in federal subsidies for that same period, marking a 10,000 percent return on investment for the industry.”
One of the most grievous subsides is mentioned in another article: “A tax deduction for oil spill remediation costs allows companies to deduct costs of oil spill clean-up from tax payments as a “standard business expense”. The most notable example occurred in 2010 when BP claimed a $9.9 billion tax deduction due to clean-up costs for the Deepwater Horizon blowout and resulting oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.”
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From the Wall Street Journal of July 17, 2014:
“Antero currently has access to a total of 600 MMcf/d of cryogenic processing capacity at the MarkWest Sherwood processing facility located in Doddridge County, West Virginia. The Company has committed to four additional 200 MMcf/d cryogenic processing plants, Sherwood 4, 5, 6 and 7. Sherwood 4 is expected to go on line in the third quarter of 2014, Sherwood 5 is expected to go on line in the fourth quarter of 2014, Sherwood 6 is expected to go on line in the second quarter of 2015 and Sherwood 7 is expected to go on line in the third quarter of 2015. These commitments provide Antero access to a total of 1.4 Bcf/d of Marcellus cryogenic processing capacity. Ethane is currently being rejected at the Sherwood processing facility and sold in the gas stream.”
The ethane is used to manufacture ethylene, which is used for making plastics (polyethylene) and a host of other products. It is the most valuable single input to the chemical industry. MarkWest lets it go through to be taken out by its customers. The hydrocarbon liquids which are removed are in a separate pipeline going away from the Sherwood plant.
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Phyllis Zorn, Staff Writer Enid News and Eagle (Oklahoma) writes in this article that up to 20,000 gallons of hydrochloric acid was spilled near Hennessy, Oklahoma, at the site of an oil well being drilled in an alfalfa field. From the article, “It’s not as bad as it sounds,” Vernon said. “When we found out it had leaked, we immediately spread soda ash on it. It’s a chemical that counteracts the acid.” My reaction is, “That’s a whole lot of fizz.”
The Aquifer is only 27 feet down. There is a question as to whether the soil would absorb it, or whether it would go down that far, contaminating the drinking water.
If you are not familiar with the usual corporate run around “I didn’t do it, but I won’t tell you who did,” and the routine denials, this article might be worth the read, but otherwise save your time.
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FracTracker Alliance has started a truck/train counting project.
Currently we have a series of counts completed in Wheeling, WV; Southwest PA; Susquehanna Co, PA; Ohio; and Wisconsin. Two more are planned for Wetzel Co., WV as well as in Wisconsin.
This is a pilot project in the works. We are continually looking for additional community participation wherever truck traffic is of concern and volunteers are willing. Please contact cassidy@fractracker.org for more information.