NORWICH – The back and forth between the county’s Natural Gas Advisory Committee Chairman and a South Plymouth resident Tuesday morning became contentious enough to call police to the Chenango County Board of Supervisors chambers.
The verbal exchange between Preston Supervisor Peter C. Flanagan and Peter Hudiburg, who is calling for a countywide moratorium on high volume horizontal hydrofracturing, calmed, however, once Flanagan insisted Hudiburg and other visitors allow him to address the meeting’s agenda and that they raise their hands to speak.
“I think you’re going to see more of this in the future,” said Town of German Supervisor and committee member Richard Schlag after the meeting. “We’re going to have to establish stricter rules for procedure.”
It was the third time Hudiburg was joined by a like-minded group of drilling protesters at a meeting of county lawmakers, though this time there were more. A crowd of 24 signed in, making the attendance, along with committee members and other county officials, about 35. The visitors asked technical questions about seismic testing, natural and stress fractures in shale and the dangers of pollution from both hydraulic fracturing fluids left underground and formation water brought back to the surface.
A referral from the Chenango County Planning and Economic Development Committee to investigate whether the county should join others that have imposed a moratorium on drilling didn’t make the agenda this month. Flanagan did ask the committee whether it wished to advise the county to proceed with such a ban. The committee opted to table any vote on the question.
Flanagan restated the committee’s purpose and position, and pointed out that all matters are fully discussed, not just the economic potential of future natural gas development in the region.
“We are not a single-issue entity, nor do we intend to be, nor are we here to list the reasons why we don’t follow the wishes of any particular group. We are here to investigate the facts. Unsubstantiated statements are not conducive to our mission,” he said.
Flanagan said the committee shared the same concerns about water contamination accidents from drilling that have occurred in other states. But he got down to specifics by pointing out that hydraulic fracturing was the not cause of them.
“It’s in the casing and the cementing,” he said, “not what’s in the fracking solutions.”
Hudiburg retorted that it was impossible to separate the two.
“It’s within the realm of possibility, that the higher pressures (of water) are going to eventually erode and crack casings over time,” he said.
Differences of opinion between the committee and those who have requested the moratorium continued with a discussion of just what exactly the New York State Senate’s nine-month moratorium entailed.
Hudiburg suggested it applied only to drilling of hard, raw formations of shale and not to the small water volume drilling in the Herkimer Sandstone currently being conducted in Chenango County by Norse Energy. Flanagan suggested that he didn’t trust the state’s legislators to be so specific, and if passed by the Assembly and signed by Gov. Paterson, that the law might actually stop drilling in all formations.
Chenango County Economic Development Consultant Steven Palmatier cited a peer review study to contradict a recent claim by the local anti-drilling populace that hyrdrofracturing caused earthquakes to occur in Texas.
Both sides cited conflicting opinions from Cornell University academics about whether horizontal fracturing would allow contaminants to reach the aquifers and whether producing natural gas will benefit the economy financially.
James B. Bays, the supervisor of the Town of Smyrna, said he had been concerned whether “the workers who were hugging the rigs all day” in his town were being exposed to toxic emissions. But, he said he was reassured after receiving a letter from a Colgate University professor who explained that benzene and toluene are more commonly found in crude oil or gas condensates, not in the dry gas found in this region.
Hudiburg said too many workers are being exposed to contaminants in the Western U.S., and he didn’t trust New York’s Department of Environmental Conservation to have enough monitors in the field for the process to ever be safe to people or the environment.
The Natural Gas Advisory Committee has been studying those issues and more, Flanagan said, while waiting to find out whether the DEC’s new regulations on hydraulic fracturing of shale will be adequate.
“Is it worth the risk to spoil our water?” asked Kim Michael of Afton.
Both sides agreed that the DEC currently lacks enough staff to regulate drilling and that water wells should be tested by outside contractors.
Flanagan expressed the committee’s sentiments when he said, “Many of us are expecting that the DEC will find a better way. Energy companies would like to find a better way. They’ve, for example, studied using propane instead of water. My experience is that they will find a better method.”
Meanwhile, seismic testing continues in the Town of Plymouth. A testing company that recently relocated to the area is employing 35 workers, about 15 percent of them local. The Plymouth Town Highway Superintendent said Norse Energy had successfully repaired South and Cookhouse Roads that it damaged while conducting drilling operations in the area last winter.
“It’s a positive thing for them to come in and fix our town roads,” said Peter Marshall.