"Feds want full disclosure of chemicals used in drilling"

PhillyBurbs.com: "Feds want full disclosure of chemicals used in drilling," by Gary Weckselblatt, Intelligencer, July 27, 2009:

Both houses of Congress are considering bills to give federal oversight of the chemicals companies use to release oil and natural gas trapped deep underground.

Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania sponsored the Senate bill, and 8th District Rep. Patrick Murphy is a co-sponsor of the House plan.

The two Democrats favor the bill, known as the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act, to amend the Safe Drinking Water Act and repeal an exemption for hydraulic fracturing.


Hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," involves the injection of a mix of water, sand and chemicals into the ground to break up rock and allow the gas to escape.

According to Casey, some of the chemicals that are known to have been used in fracking include diesel fuel, benzene, industrial solvents and other carcinogens.

"We already have private wells contaminated by gas and fluids used in hydraulic fracturing," Casey said. "We need to make sure that this doesn't become a statewide problem over the next few decades as we extract natural gas."

Murphy, who represents all of Bucks County and parts of Montgomery County and Philadelphia, said: "All the bill does is require companies to disclose what they are pumping into the ground. We need to make sure we drill in a way that doesn't endanger the drinking water."

About 300 of Nockamixon's 1,300 homeowners have signed leases that allow companies to drill for natural gas on their property. Residents received upfront cash and a promise of payment should the rock thousands of feet below their properties yield gas.

Those residents are represented by Murphy and Republican state Rep. Marguerite Quinn of the 143rd District in Central and Upper Bucks.

Quinn supports the federal legislation.

"People have the right to know what's going into their ground water supply," she said. "If something happens that taints their water, my constituents in Upper Bucks do not have the option to tap into another water source."

Not everyone, however, is on board with the repeal.

The Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Association said the repeal would kill the state's shallow gas industry and cripple the development of the Marcellus Shale.

The legislation "would require EPA permits for well construction procedures already regulated by DEP well permits," association President Steve Rhoads wrote on the group's Web site. "Pennsylvania's operators can't afford the expense and delays created by two layers of permitting for the same activities. The marginal economics of Pennsylvania's shallow gas wells could not sustain the excessive new regulatory costs that the new federal permit would impose, and operators would simply be forced to stop drilling."

Murphy doesn't believe that will be the case.

"I am pro drilling," he said. "I think we have to wean ourselves off foreign oil. To me it's a safety issue first. It's also an energy independence issue. This doesn't stop (drilling). It let's us know what chemicals are being used."