Online cover: 20 years on, fracking’s potential health impacts eyed by Karen Mansfield, Observer-Reporter
Front Page Observer-Reporter Oct 13, 2024: Posting a threat? 20 years in, fracking’s potential health impacts eyed 4th article in their shale gas series by Karen Mansfield
Dr. Ned Ketyer, President of Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania:
“The science is in. Study after study shows fracking can’t be done safely anywhere, including in Pennsylvania. Look, we have enough scientific and medical studies, we have enough data to say fracking is dangerous, and the closer you live to it, the higher the risk for you and your family.”
20 years on, fracking’s potential health impacts eyed by Karen Mansfield, Oct 13, 2024, Observer-Reporter
Editor’s note: This is the fourth in a series of stories reflecting on 20 years of gas drilling in Southwestern Pennsylvania.
Twenty years after the first gas well was fracked on theRenz farm in Mount Pleasant Township, Washington County, a body of evidence points to the possible correlation between the drilling technique and health harms, ranging from cancers, respiratory ailments, lower birth weights, and cardiovascular disease.
The industry maintains that drilling for natural gas is safe, but an increasing number of studies suggests that fracking poses a threat to public health, say public health groups and health professionals.
Last October, the ninth edition of the fracking science compendium, which includes more than 2,300 peer-reviewed medical and scientific papers, media investigations and government reports, was released and concluded that fracking poses serious health issues.
Included in the compendium was a set of three studies completed in early 2023 by researchers from the University of Pittsburgh, conducted after dozens of concerned community members in Southwestern Pennsylvania demanded an investigation into the cause of more than 67 rare cancer cases, including Ewing sarcoma, in a four-county area.
According to the PA Health and Environment Study, released in August of 2023, children living within a mile of a well had a five to seven times greater risk of developing lymphoma.
Additionally, people with asthma living within 10 miles of wells during the production phase had a four to five times greater chance of their asthma worsening. And babies whose mothers lived within 10 miles had higher odds of being born underweight and small for gestational age, the study states.
Another study, conducted by Yale University in 2022, showed that young children living about a mile from natural gas wells were two to three times more likely to develop acute lymphoblastic leukemia than children who do not live near a gas development.
Many families live much closer than the distances studied above; living right next door to and or over frac fields where wells are frac’d and refrac’d and refrac’d, again and again and again. The impacts are relentless, 24/7, sometimes for for years.
“The science is in. Study after study shows fracking can’t be done safely anywhere, including in Pennsylvania,” said Dr. Ned Ketyer, president of Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania and who lives in Washington County, the most heavily fracked county in the state. “Look, we have enough scientific and medical studies, we have enough data to say fracking is dangerous, and the closer you live to it, the higher the risk to you and your family.”
Pennsylvania is the nation’s second-largest natural gas producer after Texas.
Industry groups, including Marcellus Shale Coalition, a Pittsburgh-based organization for the natural gas industry, dismiss several shale gas studies as ambiguous studies filled with suspect statists used by opponents that “goal-seek the desired conclusions.”
They maintain there is no evidence that fracking harms public health or contaminates groundwater or air, and that natural gas is safely and responsibly extracted.Ya, they lie, relentlessly like their incessant frac’s
The coalition said that the Pitt study, in particular, carried “significant flaws, including no new research being conducted nor actual site-level measurements taken,” and pointed out that the study found no link between unconventional natural gas activity and childhood leukemia, brain or bone cancers.
“Protecting the health and safety of our employees, their families, and the communities in which we operate is our highest priority. As an industry rooted in science and engineering, we take objective and transparent research seriously. Research based on actual field monitoring by qualified professionals in Pennsylvania and across the nation demonstrates that natural gas development is protective of public health and the environment,” said David Callahan, president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, in an email.He sounds like a Trump.
“In fact, because of this safe development, increased use of natural gas has reduced air pollutants detrimental to human health, along with greenhouse gas emissions, and has delivered up to $1 trillion in public health benefitsEmbellish much Mr. Shaleman Callahan? Like all lies? for Pennsylvania residents. Our industry’s commitment to health and safety is second to none, and our members will continue to responsibly develop clean, reliable, domestic natural gas that is essential to modern life.”Commitments spewed by propagandists and industries they are paid to lie for, legally mean less than nothing, especially in the oil, gas and frac patch and even more so in frac coalitions.
It also pointed to findings from “dozens of peer reviewed studies that confirm natural gas is developed safely and responsibly” and to recent results of air emissions monitoring at well pads as part of CNX Resources’ “Radical Transparency” initiative that, the company said, shows emissions readily meet science-based air quality standards.Wowza! “Radical!” That’s a first for me. Radical Transparency! If companies would just tell the truth, there would be no need for radical anything.
Said CNX Resources Chief Risk Officer Hayley Scott at an address at last month’s Shale Insight Conference in Erie, “We all want to do everything we can to keep our communities (which includes us) safe.”
Safety questioned
But a number of residents in the region who have experienced illnesses since fracking boomed question fracking’s safety.
Ketyer and other local health advocates argue that while they can’t prove causation, “public health research is designed to find correlations and associations, and not establish causation,” and that there is,indeed, a link.
During the fracking process, natural gas is extracted by drilling thousands of feet underground and injecting massive amounts of water and a mix of chemicals to break up layers of shale rock. According to studies,people who live near production and distribution sites are exposed to pollutants including benzene, formaldehyde, toluene, xylene, diesel exhaust,fine particles, and nitrous oxides, all of which can impact health and contaminate soil, water and air.
Ketyer and other experts worry that those living near fracking wells and infrastructure including compressor stations and pipelines in Southwestern Pennsylvania are paying a heavy price.
Jodi Borello, a community organizer for the nonprofit Centerfor Coalfield Justice and co-founder of MAD-FACTS (Moms and Dads – Family Awareness of Cancer Threat Spike), contends that she, her family and neighbors have suffered health problems since a well pad and pigging station were placed1,500 feet from her South Franklin Township home in 2011.
“Almost immediately we started smelling things, and all of us had issues. We had nose bleeds, sinus issues, dizziness, headaches, nausea,rashes that covered our bodies,” said Borello, a mother of three who started to keep a journal detailing the family’s symptoms.
Starting in 2012, Borello said, emissions were vented from the pigging station seven days a week, three times a day for nearly a decade.
She said she installed a Dilos monitor (an air-quality monitor that measures particulates) in her son’s bedroom that once recorded particulate pollution nearly 900 times the level deemed safe by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Borello’s testimony at the 43rd statewide grand jury was a key part of the two-year investigation that, in 2020, called out the state Department of Environmental Protection and the Department of Health for“failing to oversee the fracking industry and fulfilling their responsibility to protect Pennsylvanians from the inherent risks of industry operations.”
The grand jury made eight recommendations to better protect Pennsylvanians.
Those recommendations included expanding setbacks from 500feet to 2,500 feet from homes and 5,000 feet from schools and hospitals, and disclosing all chemicals used during drilling and fracking – something the gas industry is not required to do for “proprietary” reasons.
But Alison Steele, executive director of the Pittsburgh-based Environmental Health Project, said meaningful action has lagged in Harrisburg. The 2,500-foot buffer proposal – which the gas industry says would effectively shut down drilling – remains stuck in the House of Representatives.
“We have a mountain of studies pointing to health harms, but we’re still not seeing enough of a meaningful health protective response fromthe government, from people who are tasked with protecting the health of Pennsylvania’s residents,” said Steele. “We have a massive gap between what is known in the scientific community about the health harms of fracking, and how that is being reflected in health protective policy.”
Bryan Latkanich of Deemston said his life “has been a nightmare” since Chevron put a well pad and pump station on his property in2013.
“It has sucked all the joy out of life,” said Latkanich, a former counselor at Washington County jail who is now on disability and battling a host of illnesses, including a brain tumor, stage four kidney failure, and congestive heart failure.
Latkanich’s 14-year-old son, Ryan – who broke out in a rash and welts when his mom bathed him in April 2013 – has been diagnosed with severe asthma and suffered from incontinence, ringing in his ears, and other health issues.
Latkanich is suing Chevron in Washington County Court,claiming he and his son were sickened after the company drilled the natural gas well on the property.
“I remember I stepped into the water after Ryan got out ofthe tub and it was the slipperiest substance I felt. It did not feel right,” he recalled. “And that was the beginning of all of this.”
A toxicology study of Latkanich’s and Ryan’s urine and saliva showed the presence of high levels of benzene and styrene in their bodies, and additional tests showed Ryan had been exposed to hydrocarbons and radiation, Latkanich said.
“I worry about my son. The anxiety and stress from this is off the charts,” said Latkanich. “My health is destroyed, my house isdestroyed. I don’t want anyone else to have to go through what I’m going through.”
‘An accidental advocate’
Janice Blanock, of Cecil Township, who co-founded MAD-FACTS at Center for Coalfield Justice with Borello, calls herself “an accident aladvocate.”
In 2016, her 19-year-old son, Luke, died from Ewing sarcoma.Only about 200 cases of Ewing sarcoma are diagnosed in the U.S. each year, but27 cases – including six in the Canon-McMillan School District – were diagnosed in Southwestern Pennsylvania during a 10-year period.
Blanock, who suspects Luke’s illness was linked to fracking,said, “there are enough studies that show kids are getting sick.”
Through MAD-FACTS, Blanock and Borello promote common sense solutions to help protect families who live near fracking, and to educate others about fracking.
“I wasn’t aware of what fracking was. When Jodi and I created (MAD-FACTS), we wanted parents to be informed. Sometimes you feel like you’re taking three steps forward but get knocked back one or two, but you just keep pushing forward and spreading the word and getting people involved. We’ve got to do it together, we’ve got to do it as a team,” said Blanock.
“I lost an exceptional child. He could have been a great leader in this world and we certainly need those now, so I’ll keep pushing on.”
Blanock said she would like Gov. Josh Shapiro – who as Pennsylvania’s attorney general said there was a need to hold oil and gas companies to account – to put the eight grand jury recommendations into action.
Borello, along with Lois Bower-Bjornson, a field organizer with Clean Air Council who hosts “Frackland Tours” in Washington County to give elected officials and members of the media a first-hand account of what it islike to live near fracking and related operations, travel monthly to Harrisburg.
They set up a MAD-FACTS table, organize meetings with legislators and do drop-in visits.
“It’s really relationship-building with legislators, getting to know them and letting them know what’s happening. They see us and they knowus, and we’ve been met with positive responses and we’ve been met with negative responses,” said Bower-Bjornson, who started the tours after her family –including her four children – started getting sick with nosebleeds, rashes, and swollen limbs, when natural gas compression stations were built within a mile of her home. “It’s a chance to get our message out,” she said.
On Nov. 4, Cecil Township supervisors are set to vote on changing the oil and gas ordinance that would place surface drilling operations2,500 feet away from “protected structures,” but waive that distance if all homeowners within that buffer zone agree to permit drilling.
Josh and Michelle Stonemark, who live about 530 feet awayfrom a well pad in the township, plan to attend the meeting. The couple moved into what they thought was their dream home around Christmas of 2018, and drilling began in 2020.
“Every time they drill, it’s 24/7 noise, the smells, it’snot sleeping, it’s constant anxiety about whether or not my kids are going to get sick,” said Michelle Stonemark.
She said she and her husband and their three children have experienced health problems, which she declined to disclose.
“It’s unbearable at times,” said Stonemark, who has installed two air monitors in the family’s back yard. “I want people to know that these problems are real. We have seen the impacts, we have dealt with them. We’re being impacted on a daily basis. They exist.”
Lisa DiPaoli, communications director at Center for Coalfield Justice, said it’s critical to work for policy change, especially with the Appalachian hydrogen hub on the horizon.
DiPaoli said CCJ isn’t seeking to stop fracking (although other groups would like an outright ban), but wants to make sure regulations are in place that will better protect the communities where fracking takes place.There is no regulation that makes frac’ing safe, and even if there was, companies would violate them because frac’ers do not give a shit about their neighbours or public health and communities, or the law. Frac’ers only care about subsidies and more subsidies, money and more money, and conning banks, investors and landowners they misuse and harm.
She pointed to a recent poll conducted by the Ohio RiverV alley Institute and Upswing Research & Strategy that suggests Pennsylvanians are open to stricter regulations on the fracking industry. The survey of 700 likely voters across the state showed that 90% of respondent support measures such as requiring fracking companies to disclose all chemicals used and increasing the distance between fracking operations and schools. It also found that 80% of respondents support classifying fracking fluids as hazardous materials. A majority of Pennsylvanians (58%) oppose a complete ban on fracking.
“We recognize we can’t just stop fracking because, first, w eneed the energy, and second, we don’t want anyone to lose their jobsSuch bullshit synergy by CCJ to enable the devastating harms by frac’ing and the petroleum industry in general. The world needs off all fossil fuels as fast as possible, like decades ago. There are safer non life destroying energies that need to be prioritized and it is vital to educate the public about life on earth being wiped out because of humanity’s greed, pollution and over population and to to learn how to live wasting less energy and to learn to live consuming less, but there has to be a just transition toward cleaner energy sources,” said DiPaoli.
Another side to ‘Shale Revolution’ Letters to the Editor by Cathy Lodge, October 3, 2024, Observer Reporter
Rick Shrum should have gotten both sides for his story“‘Shale Revolution’: A look back at 20 years of gas drilling in the region,” in the Sept. 22 edition.
Speaking with Mount Pleasant Township residents who have been negatively impacted by shale gas development would have painted a different picture.
From the beginning of the boom, residents have been misled. Representatives of oil and gas companies pressed leases on farmers, telling them that fracking was harmless. When the community began to see and question harms, nuisances, and decreased property values, Range Resources pushed back, using intimidation tactics. They sent letters to Mount Pleasant Township leaseholders threatening to pull out of the township. Elected officials were pressured to remove protective ordinances that industry felt hindered fracking activity. Locals trying to object to activity were not granted standing in their own community. The industry effectively divided the township.
Over the past 20 years, cancer incidents in students in the Fort Cherry School District living near fracking facilities have made headlines. Residents’ contaminated water and land and their exposure to benzene from shale operations were reported on. Containers labeled with radioactive waste sat on properties in the township. Property values near shale development have decreased. A study from the University of Pittsburgh and the Pennsylvania Department of Health showed ill effects from the industry. And yet, residents continue to fight to have the industry abide by Mount Pleasant Township ordinances.
Focusing on the Chamber of Commerce’s view of economic prosperity does not show the industry’s threat to Mount Pleasant Township’s right to clean air, water and the preservation of the environment’s natural value.
Shrum’s article is one-sided.
Cathy Lodge
Bulger
Dr. Sandra Steingraber @ssteingraber1:
GREAT overview of our research on the health harms of fracking—increased cancer, asthma, and heart attacks for people living nearby—and the dismissal of the evidence by PA gas industry reps who sound just like tobacco execs in 1964. That old Broadway show.
Refer also to:
2019: Frac’ing creates jobs. Really? Frac jobs keep getting frac’d: CNX lays off about 50 workers, “This is part of our normal course as we’re always looking…to get better.” at profit-raping everywhere frac’ers operate.
Twelve years later, Health Canada’s frac harm review still has not been publicly released.
