Apr 19
2010

Shreveport Times (Louisiana) report:

Chesapeake, Schlumberger fined $22,000 each in cows’ deaths

By Vickie Welborn • vwelborn@gannett.com • March 25, 2010

KEITHVILLE – Chesapeake Energy Corp. and its contractor Schlumberger Technology Corp. each must pay $22,000 for violating state law in connection with the deaths almost a year ago of 17 cows at a natural gas well site.

Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality mailed identical letters spelling out the settlement agreement with both companies on Tuesday. Each was informed that it must advertise the agreement and invite public comment.

Both companies deny the material discharged from the natural gas well site killed the cows, deny violations were committed and neither makes an admission of liability, according to the settlement document signed by LDEQ Assistant Secretary Paul D. Miller. Included in each fine is $1,300 in enforcement costs.

In a joint statement from Chesapeake’s Kevin McCotter and Schlumberger’s Stephen T. Harris, both companies acknowledged today entering into a proposed settlement agreement.

. . . . .

Citizens noticed the dying cows April 28 in a pasture owned by Cecil and Tyler Williams on state Highway 169 near the corner of Keatchie-Marshall Road in south Caddo Parish. Witnesses reported hearing them bellowing and seeing them bleeding before they fell over dead.

At the time, Schlumberger, as a contractor of Chesapeake, was performing routine fracturing of the natural gas well. LDEQ determined during its investigation that fluid leaked from the well pad then ran into an adjacent pasture after a rain.

Read full story at:

http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20100325/NEWS01/100325018/Chesapeake-Schlumberger-fined-22-000-each-in-cows-deaths

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Mar 17
2010

Citizens for Healthy Communities

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:  March 17, 2010

March 19th Chemung Economic Forum Comes Under Fire
Chemung County Chamber of Commerce’s March 19th Economic Forum on natural gas drilling in the Southern Tier, to be moderated by Chemung County Executive Thomas Santulli, is being criticized for prohibiting the public and including presentations dominated by the gas industry and its supporters.  Although the Forum, scheduled for Friday, March 19 at 7:30 am at the Holiday Inn-Riverview in Elmira, was advertised as open to the public, many people who called for reservations to the event were turned down.

“When I called on March 3, I was told that the Forum was sold out,” said David Walczak of Bath, “but others who called for tickets to the breakfast were told that the event was only open to members of the Chamber.”

The scheduled speakers at the forum are heavily biased toward the gas industry.  They are natural gas industry officials from Chesapeake Energy Corp and Schlumberger, Inc., a representative of the Pennsylvania College of Technology who has spoken out extensively in support of hydraulic fracturing drilling of the Marcellus Shale and someone from Cornell University.

“If the Economic Forum was merely a private Chamber of Commerce meeting, they would certainly have every right to exclude non-members,” said Mark Schlechter, a resident of Steuben County, ”but the participation of the County Executive, and possibly other elected officials, turns the Forum into a public event.  The actions of the Chamber and the County Executive in excluding concerned members of the community raise questions about what will be discussed at the Forum and, more importantly, what decisions will be made by our elected leaders about gas drilling in our region.”

There is currently a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing, known as “fracking”, in New York State due to concerns about the environmental and economic effects of the drilling and plans to build a Schlumberger gas drilling service facility in Horseheads are on hold pending a State Supreme Court ruling on the issue.  A number of organizations have formed in area counties to raise public awareness of the hazards of injecting and storing millions of gallons of toxic-laced water into the ground and of the numerous examples of water contamination, air pollution and noise and odor complaints in other states where fracking has occurred.

“If public policy is to be set through closed forums such as the one moderated by our County Executive, then the public has a right to know what is being said and which elected officials are in attendance,” said Patricia Ladley, a Chemung County resident. ”This issue is too important to the health and economic well-being of our communities for us to be excluded.”

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Sep 16
2009

From
http://www.timesleader.com/news/Gas-lease_offer__lsquo_excites_rsquo__area_group_09-16-2009.html

Gas-lease offer ‘excites’ area group

After ’08 deal dies, Wyoming County Landowners expect Chesapeake Energy deal

“We knew that we wanted a company that could afford to buy 37,000 acres … that could not only buy us, but drill us,” Lines-Burgess [landowners' coalition secretary] said. “In order to do that, we knew we had to go for the cream of the crop.”

Cattle dead next to hydraulic fracturing job on Chesapeake natural gas well:

__________________________________

From The Shreveport Times:

The ’stuff’ killed the cows, sheriff says
Prator questions whether drilling company has reported incident.

By Vickie Welborn •  June 25, 2009

That’s Caddo Sheriff Steve Prator’s assessment of what contributed to the deaths of 17 cows in late April near a natural gas drilling location south of Spring Ridge.

Until now, none of the state agencies involved in the ongoing inquiry into the incident has stated what caused the cattle to drop dead in Skipper Williams Jr.’s pasture on state Highway 169.

The deaths were reported at some point after a liquid leaked from the well, which was in the completion process, and pooled into a low area accessible to the cows. The substance later was determined to contain elevated chlorides, oil, grease and some organic compounds.

But no state agency took responsibility for testing the animals. Results from a necropsy performed by Williams’ private veterinarian are unavailable.

On Wednesday, Prator gathered representatives of his and Caddo District Attorney Charles Scott’s offices, the Caddo Commission, state police and the state Environmental Quality, Natural Resources and Agriculture and Forestry departments in one room to review all the reports connected to the incident.

“We went over for an hour exactly what everybody’s response was, and everybody’s response and cooperation was really good,” the sheriff said. “We responded to the scene well. When everyone found out about it we all worked together very well.

“We have determined — although no one agency except me will say this — by piecing everything together, there was a spill from the site that ran off of the site and that was ingested by the cows and that’s what caused the cows to die.”

State veterinarian Michael Barrington confirmed the cows’ deaths were neither natural nor caused by disease, a release from Prator’s office states.
. . . . .
Still undetermined is whether the spill was reported and, if so, whether it was reported in a timely manner. “We contend it should have been reported. And the timeliness of it we’re investigating,” Prator said.
. . . . .
State police, the sheriff’s office and Environmental Quality still are looking into the timeliness of the reporting. Findings of the sheriff’s office and state police will be turned over to Scott for review. Environmental Quality will move its report through its channels.

Environmental Quality was notified via its hotline when Chesapeake Energy learned of the dead cattle. And over the next 72 hours, the company worked with Schlumberger, the sheriff’s office and other agencies involved to investigate the incident, McCotter said.
. . . . .
“While Chesapeake, Schlumberger and others have conducted water and soil analysis, Chesapeake and Schlumberger have not had access to the cattle owners’ necropsy and toxicology reports and have, therefore, been unable to draw any conclusions as to the cause of the cattle deaths,” McCotter said.
. . . . .
“If at the time it happened proper notification had been made, there are chances cows would still be alive right now,” the sheriff said. “In this case, this was cows. How unfortunate. But what if it was children?”

.

For complete story, see: http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20090625/NEWS01/906250326/0/L/The–stuff–killed-the-cows–sheriff-says

.
For an important post on gas drilling’s effects on livestock and farmers, see also:
http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/amall/oil_and_gas_impacts_on_livesto.html

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Sep 11
2009

Report from Seneca Daily Journal, Seneca, South Carolina:
—————————————————————————–

By Andrew Moore (Contact / Staff Bio)
July 8, 2009

ANDERSON — “United States District Judge G. Ross Anderson Jr. has instructed Schlumberger Technology Corporation attorney John Hanson to formally submit a design plan for removing two dams on Twelve Mile River by the end of August, putting a serious alteration on the company’s own timelines of providing the final design by November.

“A public hearing on Tuesday at the federal courthouse in Anderson highlighted Judge Anderson’s disdain for Schlumberger’s failure to remove the dams along with polychlorinated biphenyl-contaminated sediment more than three years after he instructed the company to do so in a 2006 consent decree.

“For more than two decades, a manufacturing facility on the river pumped hundreds of thousands of pounds of PCBs into the river’s tributaries. The river feeds into Lake Hartwell, the bottom of which is covered by PCB-contaminated sediment from the river’s toxic flow. Removing hundreds of yards of sediment from the river, coupled with eliminating two of the three old dams there, would allow fresh sediment to naturally flow and settle on top of the toxic sediments at the bottom of Hartwell, which has a ban on eating fish caught there.

“Anderson has given Schlumberger until July 2010 to remove the dams, and is also demanding the company turn over all quarterly progress reports on the project to him so that he may in turn immediately release them to the media and general public.

“Anderson said he would assume full control of the project after Schlumberger’s apparent circumventing of his 2006 order.

“’I’m not an engineer,’ he said. ‘But this is what you get into when you stoop to fooling a federal court.’

“Brad Wyche, executive director of conservation group Upstate Forever, told Anderson he also believed the delays in the project were intentional.

“’I think it’s clear what’s been going on,’ Wyche said.

“At the heart of the delays were a series of changes in project managers as well as contractors for the job. Joe Carroll of Restoration Systems, the contractor initially tapped for the project, told Anderson the contract was terminated when he was reluctant to sign an 85-page amendment to an originally 15-page agreement.

“’They may live to regret that,’ Anderson said of Schlumberger’s departure from the plan consistent with his consent decree.

“Lawrence Dyck, a retired Clemson University science professor and Twelve Mile River resident, said he was skeptical about the supposed progress Schlumberger had made.

“’We’re no closer to removing those dams than when you signed those decrees in 2006,’ Dyck said.  ‘We’re maybe farther away.’

“Anderson emphasized at the end of the hearing that there was no more time to “fool around” with his order, and that he was taking the reins of the project himself.

“’Frankly, I don’t trust you,’ he said, as he looked toward Schlumberger’s legal team.”

Source:
http://www.upstateforever.org/newsviews_ufnews.html
http://www.upstateforever.org/newsviews_ufnews/UFN_2009/ufn090708SDJ_JudgeTakesReinsInRiverPollutionSaga.pdf
.

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Sep 9
2009

Horseheads High School, 7pm
401 Fletcher St.
Horseheads, NY 14845

Contributed:

“The time to make a difference is tonight,  7PM at Horseheads High School.

“For the village of Horseheads, as lead agency, to have the ability to allow a huge corporation like Schlumberger to build a giant facility serving a 300-mile gas drilling radius with EXPLOSIVES, RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL AND CONCENTRATED TOXIC CHEMICALS across the street from a school , without requiring a full EIS is appalling. The truck traffic has been estimated in THE HUNDREDS of trucks from the site to and from the facility PER DAY. This three hundred mile radius includes most, if not all of us, but we have absolutely no voice.

“THE VILLAGE OF HORSEHEADS IS NOT REQUIRING AN ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT.

“All for a few hundred “jobs”, most of them dangerous and unpleasant. Is NYS’s economy so bad we are reduced to allowing rapacious businesses to flagrantly abuse the most vulnerable of us all? If natural gas extraction by unconventional means must occur as part of a well-thought out and soberly constructed NYS energy plan, then LET US DO IT METHODICALLY AND CAREFULLY.

“Instead, these companies have used highly financed, stealthy, and forceful techniques to get their way, from their cronies at the top to the landmen sharks who coerced landowner-victims into signing leases they had no context of understanding.

“The world is upside down. We don’t cherish our agricultural areas, our forests, our fresh water supplies in this country or this state anymore. And now, we see that many people are OKAY WITH NOT CHERISHING THE HEALTH AND SAFETY OF OUR CHILDREN, EITHER.

“From a Horseheads area resident and friend: “Even if people don’t want to speak, they need to attend in order to help fill the room and to hear what others say. But those who are willing to just make one simple point of their choice (especially about immediate air pollution and health hazards from Diesel exhaust and later water contamination) should be strongly encouraged to do so. Call some friends. Arrange car pools. The press will be there because it’s been announced repeatedly in both papers, and TV should be there, too. This is the only chance to speak publicly on this topic before the joint board workshop on Sept. 15. Then they will probably sometime afterwards in private make their decision of a positive or negative declaration of environmental impact (with subsequent automatic requirement of EIS or not) and the Village Board of Trustees hold its official vote on it at its next regular meeting (Sept 24).”

“So please show up, and show that you care about the runaway railroad train that is the oil and gas drilling industry moving into NYS without appropriate impact studies, oversight and transparency..”

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Trackback  •  Posted in Community Effects, Mean Energy, On the Bleeding Edge, The Fox is Guarding the Henhouse  


Jun 28
2009

From The Shreveport Times:

The ‘stuff’ killed the cows, sheriff says

• Prator questions whether drilling company has reported incident.

By Vickie Welborn • vwelborn@gannett.com • June 25, 2009

That’s Caddo Sheriff Steve Prator’s assessment of what contributed to the deaths of 17 cows in late April near a natural gas drilling location south of Spring Ridge.

Until now, none of the state agencies involved in the ongoing inquiry into the incident has stated what caused the cattle to drop dead in Skipper Williams Jr.’s pasture on state Highway 169.

The deaths were reported at some point after a liquid leaked from the well, which was in the completion process, and pooled into a low area accessible to the cows. The substance later was determined to contain elevated chlorides, oil, grease and some organic compounds.

But no state agency took responsibility for testing the animals. Results from a necropsy performed by Williams’ private veterinarian are unavailable.

On Wednesday, Prator gathered representatives of his and Caddo District Attorney Charles Scott’s offices, the Caddo Commission, state police and the state Environmental Quality, Natural Resources and Agriculture and Forestry departments in one room to review all the reports connected to the incident.

“We went over for an hour exactly what everybody’s response was, and everybody’s response and cooperation was really good,” the sheriff said. “We responded to the scene well. When everyone found out about it we all worked together very well.

“We have determined — although no one agency except me will say this — by piecing everything together, there was a spill from the site that ran off of the site and that was ingested by the cows and that’s what caused the cows to die.”

State veterinarian Michael Barrington confirmed the cows’ deaths were neither natural nor caused by disease, a release from Prator’s office states.
. . . . .
Still undetermined is whether the spill was reported and, if so, whether it was reported in a timely manner. “We contend it should have been reported. And the timeliness of it we’re investigating,” Prator said.
. . . . .
State police, the sheriff’s office and Environmental Quality still are looking into the timeliness of the reporting. Findings of the sheriff’s office and state police will be turned over to Scott for review. Environmental Quality will move its report through its channels.

Environmental Quality was notified via its hotline when Chesapeake Energy learned of the dead cattle. And over the next 72 hours, the company worked with Schlumberger, the sheriff’s office and other agencies involved to investigate the incident, McCotter said.
. . . . .
“While Chesapeake, Schlumberger and others have conducted water and soil analysis, Chesapeake and Schlumberger have not had access to the cattle owners’ necropsy and toxicology reports and have, therefore, been unable to draw any conclusions as to the cause of the cattle deaths,” McCotter said.
. . . . .
“If at the time it happened proper notification had been made, there are chances cows would still be alive right now,” the sheriff said. “In this case, this was cows. How unfortunate. But what if it was children?”

For complete story, see: http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20090625/NEWS01/906250326/0/L/The–stuff–killed-the-cows–sheriff-says

For an important post on gas drilling’s effects on livestock and farmers, see also:
http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/amall/oil_and_gas_impacts_on_livesto.html

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Trackback  •  Posted in Bad Neighbors, Community Effects, Cost Externalization, Fraccidents, Mean Energy, On the Bleeding Edge, The Fox is Guarding the Henhouse  


Apr 29
2009

.

gas-well-dead-cattle1


_________________________________________________________________

http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20090429/NEWS01/904290368/1060

http://www.shreveporttimes.com/article/20090430/NEWS01/90430061/0/NEWS

Click on links  for complete story and photo galleries

DEQ: ‘Nobody is owning up to it’

By Vickie Welborn • vwelborn@gannett.com • April 29, 2009

Photo Galleries

SPRING RIDGE – An unidentified substance that apparently flowed from a natural gas drilling site into a pasture is is being eyed as a potential cause of the deaths of 19 head of cattle Tuesday evening, according to the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality.

The contaminated area is … adjacent to the well that Chesapeake Energy Corp. is drilling on state Highway 169 near the corner of Keatchie-Marshall Road in south Caddo Parish. Tests to determine the nature of the milky white substance that had pooled into a low area could take a week to complete, Northwest Regional Director Otis Randle said today.

Authorities believe the cows ingested the liquid before dying. Tracks went to and from the puddles, a Caddo sheriff’s office spokeswoman said.

Chesapeake and its fracing contractor, Schlumberger, have denied knowledge of a chemical release on the site, Randle said. “Nobody is owning up to it.”

See also:

http://txsharon.blogspot.com/2009/03/video-cattle-drink-barnett-shale.html
http://www.unitedneighborsforoilandgasrights.org/
http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/newscience/2007/2007-0410dahlgrenetal.html
http://splashdownpa.blogspot.com/2009/04/19-cows-die-near-chesapeake-energy-gas.html
http://txsharon.blogspot.com/2009/04/hydraulic-fracture-fluid-kills-cattle.html

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Trackback  •  Posted in Bad Neighbors, Community Effects, Cost Externalization, Fraccidents, Gas Drilling Accidents, General