FRACK FREE NATION

2/15/2015

Dear NY Fractivists, Climate Change Leaders, Peace & Social Justice Activists, Indigenous & Civil Rights Movement Leaders, Labor & Trade Union Leaders, and Organic/Family Farm Advocates:

THE TIME IS NOW
We are at a crucial moment where we need to make our voices heard. Our movement has been transitioning from a statewide battle for a ban on fracking, to fighting numerous fossil fuel infrastructure projects locally in our own backyards. We continue to be fracked on so many levels.  While many of these battles involve Federal Government rubber-stamping (FERC), there are many issues that can be addressed on the State level as well--and must be.

We need a complete freeze on fossil fuel infrastructure, and a phase out and shut down of nuclear power and climate cooking biomass and waste incineration.  We need to reduce energy demand and transition to 100% clean renewable energy, prioritizing conservation, efficiency, solar, wind and energy storage.  To allow another gas-fired power plant, pipeline, storage, processing,  export facility, or bomb train, is to be complicit in the poisoning of Pennsylvania, Colorado, Ohio and North Dakota. We can no longer afford to endanger our own children, communities, water supplies and food sources. Insofar as the production and processing of hydrocarbons contribute to climate change, we can no longer allow this to be our legacy to future New Yorkers.

In the coming months, Governor Cuomo will be required by the EPA to make a decision that will affect NY, the nation, and the planet in the immediate future and for generations to come.  The EPA, under it’s “Clean Air” Plan is urging governors to meet carbon reduction requirements by transitioning to gas fired generation in place of coal - as many as 300 new gas fired plants are proposed in 45 states.
http://www.energyjustice.net/content/why-we-must-fight-gas-fired-power-plants
We need to demand that Governor Cuomo put forth a plan that includes only clean, renewable, waste and emission free energy, as per Mark Jacobson’s Solutions Plan.  http://news.stanford.edu/news/2014/february/fifty-states-renewables-022414.html

JOBS JOBS JOBS
While eliminating many unhealthy jobs in the dirty fossil fuel industry, we call on Governor Cuomo to ensure a Just Transition to clean and renewable energy by launching a massive program that brings good paying Green jobs back to our ailing Southern Tier, Central, and Western NY economies.  As well, we call for energy justice, with more programs to help low income New Yorkers in making this transition.  We want the power literally back in the hands of our local communities, as in Home Rule, where we have a say where, and what types of infrastructure projects are allowed in our communities.

WHO WE ARE
We are inspired by the actions taken by the Seneca Lake resistance movement, which represents the very kind of action we can learn from and emulate. These brave folks have withstood police arrests and cold winds, long hours of standing, and being herded into paddy wagons. In the process, they have stood strong. There are also substantial pockets of resistance to the various pipelines and gas infrastructure proposals across NYS. We need to bring the message to Albany, The blockade to save Seneca Lake is only a small sample of what is to come, if fossil fuel infrastructure is allowed to pollute our state and threaten our future.  If 400,000 can make the trip to NYC to demand action on climate change, surely we can organize 4,000 to convene in Albany. If 200 people can risk arrest at Seneca Lake to oppose Crestwood's construction of a dangerous LNG facility, surely we can get at least 200 to do NVDA in Albany where media cannot ignore the message.

EARTH DAY 2015
What we are proposing is an Energize Democracy Climate Justice Rally in Albany on Earth Day, Wednesday, April 22, 2015.  We propose that our issue base be broad and comprehensive in hopes of generating a massive presence of New York activists engaged in the struggle to end fossil fuel domination.  Explosive Bakken oil bomb trains threatening horrors for our inner cities, frack sand trains spreading silicosis in the lungs of our loved ones, and landfills accepting radioactive frack waste from Pennsylvania, all equally need our attention, As well, Nuclear power is a serious threat to our communities and future sustainability. The time has come to make the transition.  We envision our message gaining support from Pennsylvania fractivists, as well as activists from Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey and New Hampshire. We are all fighting the very same industrial beast.

Four thousand people in Albany can make some noise.  The fact is that many of our groups are either already doing-- or are preparing for-- the use of Non Violent Direct Action (NVDA) - Peaceful resistance tactics, in the infrastructure battle.  Our premise is to capture that energy and conviction and bring this to Governor Cuomo's doorstep. The mainstream media cannot ignore 200 people willing to get arrested for their conviction, The media attention brings more public awareness and puts pressure on the politicians.

OUR PROPOSAL
Frack Free Nation proposes the following:

 1. A large permitted rally in Albany, NY this April 22, 2015 with a target of 4,000 to 10,000       attendees.

 2.  A strong focused message: It's a Crime to Poison Us: End all Fossil Fuels - Renewables Now.

 3.  Powerful speakers, movement voices from each local infrastructure fight, Green voices and visionaries, scientists and people who live in the shale fields. Musical performances and Guerilla Theater are additional possibilities.

4.  A well planned NVDA action involving as many as 200 of us, peacefully willing to risk arrest--  either in a Die-In or a Tarsands - 350.org styled Blockade (yet to be decided) and possibly with  
celebrity involvement as well, will be employed as part of a longer term direct action strategy.
We have the intent of delivering our letter of demands to Governor Cuomo. If he receives them personally and agrees to them, there need not be any arrests.

 5.  Groups, individuals and families, that are not comfortable with NVDA, could still be supportive of the legally-permitted rally and climate march and NOT risk arrest, and will be provided with socially conscious music in the park during the time of the direct action at the governor’s office.

 6.  The possibility of further broadening our message - Factory farming and GMO/pesticide use is also a major contributor to climate change and the poisoning of our planet.  The peace movement could be drawn in as well, as the U.S. military is a major contributor to climate change and most of the wars that rage on have everything to do with U.S. dependence on fossil fuels.  These are areas where we can further increase the base of our movement.

"THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING"
A large enough rally, combined with the media attention brought by a large NVDA action, has the potential to push Governor Cuomo to be the first truly Green governor of NYS.  Regardless, at the end of the day, we will have gained great media attention and raised public awareness on all our related issues and promoted Green voices not only in NYS but across the nation.  We are giving Governor Cuomo the chance to truly lead the nation in the Renewable Revolution we so desperately need for the future of our planet. Not only could Governor Cuomo set an example for the rest of the nation, it could also affect the NY State delegation to the upcoming U.N. Climate Change Conference in Paris in November.  Putting this type of pressure on, we could on Earth Day, 2015, look at our movement and say, "This Changes Everything".

YOUR INPUT IS NEEDED
At this point, we are seeking input from leaders across NYS.  Early on in this process we are receiving enthusiastic support from individual activists in the Seneca Lake, Pipeline Opposition groups, Energy Justice, Green Party, Climate Change, Anti Nuclear, Idle No More and Occupy movements.  But we need more input from official groups to move forward and ensure success.  This will take the involvement of many activists. We will be circulating an invitation to participate in a conference call within the next few weeks to facilitate your participation and involvement.

Will you join with Frack Free Nation as an individual and/or as an established group, in bringing our issues to Governor Cuomo's doorstep and into the living rooms of many sleeping Americans? 

Will you help make 2015 the year of the Renewable Revolution, where we can look back and tell our grandchildren years from now that we stood up for their future? 

Let's make Earth Day, Wednesday, April, 22 2015, the day which we can look back at and say, "This Changed Everything," and know that we did.

For The Next Seven Generations,

Abram S. Loeb, Founding Director  & The Frack Free Nation Planning Committee
Frack Free Nation  
Abram@frackfreenation.org      607-345-4865
The FrackFreeNation.org website is currently under re-construction and will back on line within the next few days.  In the mean time, organizational sign ons and inquiries can be directed to:
Abram@frackfreenation.org


Frack Free Nation, Inc. is a non-profit organization formed to educate about the impact of the petrochemical and nuclear industries on a broad range of environmental, peace and social justice issues. Frack Free Nation seeks to mobilize the public to participate in the democratic process regarding these matters for the next seven generations.
          
Coverage of past action by Frack Free Nation
http://www.prweb.com/releases/frackfreenation/Albany/prweb9521001.htm

Facebook Page Link - https://www.facebook.com/frackfreenation

Facebook Group Link -
https://www.facebook.com/groups/325643190966155/328644133999394

California Fracking

Hazards of Open Pits for Storing Wastewater From Fracking Is Focus of New Study

In 2013, industry produced 8 billion gallons of oil in California and 130 billion gallons of wastewater, according to the report.

By David Hasemyer, InsideClimate News
An unlined oil wastewater pit in Kern County, California.

A new report by two environmental organizations document the risks of using unlined pits for oil and gas wastewater disposal, and challenges whether California's regulatory system adequately addresses the hazards. Credit: Clean Water Action
Unlined open-air wastewater pits brimming with the toxic leftovers of fracking and other types of oil and gas development are threatening California's air and water quality, according to a study by two national environmental organizations.

A visit to a series of wastewater pits in California's Central Valley that sickened researchers prompted the study, according to the authors. Oil and gas drilling has been generating vast amounts of waste in the region for decades.

The report was issued by Clean Water Action and Earthworks, both based in Washington, D.C.
The groups' findings further document the risks of using unlined pits for oil and gas wastewater disposal and challenge whether California's regulatory system adequately addresses the hazards. The report highlights threats to water, air and health; documents regulatory failures; and proposes immediate remedies.

"The discharge of wastewater into unlined pits threatens water resources, including potential sources of drinking and irrigation water, and impacts air quality due to the off-gassing of chemicals from the wastewater," according to the 28-page report, "In the Pits."

The study's conclusions reflect the same issues that worry people in states from Texas and Pennsylvania to Colorado and New Mexico where fracking—hydraulic fracturing—is creating billions of gallons of wastewater that often ends up in open pits.

In most states where fracking is booming, InsideClimate News found that air emissions from oil and gas waste are among the least regulated, least monitored and least understood components in the extraction and production cycle.

The California study focused on a series of pits in Kern County, around Bakersfield. The report suggests that hundreds of pits throughout the state and especially those in the heavily drilled Central Valley pose environmental and health threats.

"We think this is potentially the biggest impact of oil and gas development in California," said Andrew Grinberg, oil and gas program manager for Clean Water Action, in issuing the report.
California is the fourth-largest oil producing state in the U.S., according to the report.  In 2013, the industry produced 8 billion gallons of oil in California while generating 130 billion gallons of wastewater, or approximately 15 barrels of wastewater for every barrel of oil, according to the report.

There are more than 400 active oil-and-gas industry pits in California where toxic chemicals, heavy metals and volatile organic compounds seep into the ground and evaporate into the air, according to the report. The industry uses similar wastewater pits across the country.

The majority of the California pits are near waterways, increasing the likelihood that spills and surface-to-groundwater migration will affect water resources, the report found.

A review of public documents by the organizations disclosed that an underground plume of pollution matching the characteristics of the wastewater in a Kern County pit stretched nearly a mile from the holding pond.

Independent air sampling performed for the environmental organizations at one disposal site identified 24 volatile organic compounds and methane. In addition, the concentrations of Benzene and 2-Hexanone were above the Long Term Effects Screening Levels used by the Environmental Protection Agency to gauge potential health consequences, according to the report.

These chemicals pose risks ranging from cancer and neurological damage to headaches, nausea and nosebleeds, said Jhon Arbelaez, Earthworks' California organizer.

"We are very concerned about the health effects from air contamination from these pits," Arbelaez said. Yet very little has been done to document the hazards to human health from waste pit emissions, he said.

This wastewater has largely escaped rigorous oversight because of decisions Congress and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency made decades ago, when oil and gas producers lobbied to get most of their waste exempted from federal hazardous waste regulations.

Tom Frantz, a Kern County almond farmer whose 36 acres of land sits in the midst of oil and gas development, said the peril posed the pits extends beyond the mostly rural area.

"We need to have clean water and air to produce healthy foods," he told reporters. "Whatever is disposed of in that cheap, sloppy manner will cause a disaster for farmers and the food they produce."

The organizations recommend that the State Water Board immediately prohibit discharge of oil and gas wastewater into unlined pits, determine where water sources have been contaminated by waste from the pits and develop a clean-up plan. The groups also called for the California Air Resources Board to increase oversight of open-air pits to prevent off-gassing of dangerous air pollutants and greenhouse gases.

Douglas K. Patteson, supervising water resource control engineer for the California Regional Water Quality Control Board's Central Valley Region, said the agency has been working to identify unlined pits and update their permit status. The board plans to prohibit unlined pits where they pose an unacceptable threat to ground water, though the agency doesn’t believe all pits pose the same risks, he said.

"The Board has made it a top priority to inventory and analyze the potential threats to drinking water from the existing sumps, particularly any remaining active ponds that are overlying good quality groundwater," he said. The agency will take enforcement actions when violations are found, he said.

Dave Clegern, a spokesman for the California Air Resources Board, said the agency couldn’t comment because it hadn't reviewed the report.

The study focused on one set of pits near McKittrick, Calif., where oil companies dispose of more than 4 million gallons of wastewater daily from surrounding oil fields, according to the study. Clean Water Action researchers reported that from a distance they saw a large tanker truck that appeared to be dumping water into the ground, according to a narrative of the visit in the report.

As researchers neared the site, warning signs cautioned of the possible presence of hydrogen sulfide, a poisonous gas associated with oil and gas. Once at the site and out of their vehicles, group members were immediately hit with a noxious odor, according to the report.

"Several tied bandanas around their mouths and noses to block the fumes," the report said.  "In less than five minutes, many in the group complained of nausea and headaches."

What they found were a few dozen long, narrow ponds, including some with liquids of different shades of green, brown and black. At one pond, two pipes were discharging steaming black and green fluids into to the waste pool where vapors rose off the surface.

"A thick black ring of what appeared to be oil rimmed the bank, and a shimmering black layer floated on the surface," according to the report. From there, pipes connected the first pond to other, larger ponds stretching hundreds of yards into the distance.

Read the report:

CA Oil and Gas Pit Report 

Source:  Inside Climate News http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20141120/hazards-open-pits-storing-wastewater-fracking-focus-new-study