The Delaware Riverkeeper Network champions the rights of our communities to a Delaware River and tributary streams that are free-flowing, clean, healthy and abundant with a diversity of life.www.delawareriverkeeper.org

Delaware River Watershed by State

New York State = 2,362 sq mi; 18.5%Pennsylvania = 6,422 sq. mi; 50.3%New Jersey =2,969 sq mi; 23.3%Delaware =1,004 sq mi; 7.9%

DE Bay = 782 sq. mi

Freedom of speechFreedom of the pressFreedom of religionRight to peaceable assemblyRight for the people to keep and bear armsDue process rightsPrivate property rightsRight to trial by jury

Our right to pure water, clean air and a healthy environment

Culm Pile in Scranton, PA, 1910. Photo Credit Horgans of Scranton and Library of Congress

Photo found at: http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/kochel/classes/susqriver/september21.htmThere is no more shocking example of greed and utter disregard for public welfare than the ruthless devastation of the forests of Pennsylvania by the lumber companies between 1840 and 1900. Quoted in A Century of Forest Resources Education at Penn State, agricultural historian S. W. Fletcher wrote in 1955Throughout the 1800s, timber barons cut down nearly all of Pennsylvanias forests. They were joined by the charcoal industry; an ironworks furnace cleared roughly an acre of trees every day to make charcoal, a key ingredient in the iron making process. http://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/MontAlto.html

Smoke Pollution in Pittsburgh, 1941. Photo credit: Archives Svce Center, Univ of Pittsburgh

Article 1, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution:The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvanias public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.

February 3, 1971Passed house 199 0May 18, 1971Placed on BallotVoters approvedBy a vote of 4 to 11,021,342 to 259,979 February 15, 1971Passed senate 45 0

42 Years

Until December 2013

Enter Shale Gas Extraction

Mid-2000s

Photo: Dick Martin

5,000,000 Gallons Water Per Well

+

1/2 % to 2 % chemicals/additives25,000 to 100,000 Gallons Chemicals

Per Well:

Nearly 9,000 Wells Drilled= 45,000,000,000 = 45 Billion

100,000 Wells Industry Hopes For = 500,000,000,000 = 500 BillionPennsylvania Alone

DieselEthylene GlycolPolyethylene Glycol mixtureAcetic AnhydridGluteraldehydeMethanolHydrochloric Acid

Toxins Drawn From the Geology ChlorideBromideSulfideBarium StrontiumBenzene TolueneFrack Fluid (slurry) additivesProppants

MethaneNaturally Occurring Radioactive Material Uranium - 238 Radium- 226Thorium 232 Mercury TDS making flowback 5 to 8 times as salty as sea water. (sea water ~ 30,000 40,000 ppm TDS)

Spring water - Clearville, PA 2009 Residents report it smells like motor oil (Fracktracker)

Triple Play of ProblemsPoor performance and government oversightInadequate regulationsUnmet technical and environmental challengesWastewater

Injection wells used primarily nationwide

PA produced 1.2 billion gallons in 2012

Frac Fluid Spill at Cabot Gas Well, Dimock, PA, 9.09

Health Impacts from Shale Gas Emissions

Climate ChangeNew Hope, PA Delaware River 06

Example of a Wet Ditch Crossing:Tennessee 300 Line Extension Project across the West River Branch, Lackawaxen

Wet Crossing Lackawaxan River 9-8-11

Communities Overwhelmed Industry Wanted and Got More Photo: Skytruth

Act 13

Argued

Shale Gas Inevitably Destructive on Communities and the Environment

Law Violates Our Environmental RightsRobinson Township, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, et al v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania., --- A.3d ---, 2103 WL 6687290 (Pa., Dec. 19, 2013)

The industry uses two techniques that enhance recovery of natural gas from these unconventional gas wells: hydraulic fracturing or fracking (usually slick-water fracking) and horizontal drilling. Both techniques inevitably do violence to the landscape. p. 8

By any responsible account, the exploitation of the Marcellus Shale Formation will produce a detrimental effect on the environment, on the people, their children, and future generations, and potentially on the public purse, perhaps rivaling the environmental effects of coal extraction. p. 118

Courtesy of ALLARM

The public natural resources implicated by the optimal accommodation of industry here are resources essential to life, health, and liberty: surface and ground water, ambient air, and aspects of the natural environment in which the public has an interest.

Article 1, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution:The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvanias public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.

PA Supreme Court Recognizes:

Right to pure water, clean air, healthy environmentInherent & indefeasible rights -- not given but acknowledged by constitutionBelonging to present and future generationsTo be protected by all levels of governmentRobinson Township, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, et al v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania., , Dec. 19, 2013

What Next?

Healthy Environment is aRIGHTExpect It!

For the Generations

Art. 1, Section 27Applies to all environmental issues

[E]nvironmental changes, whether positive or negative, have the potential to be incremental, have a compounding effect, and develop over generations. The Environmental Rights Amendment offers protection equally against actions with immediate severe impact on public natural resources and against actions with minimal or insignificant present consequences that are actually or likely to have significant or irreversible effects in the short or long term.

Constitutional Environmental Rights

Not every state has one but should be (35/15)

Matters what they say

Matters What They SayMinnesota

.. Navigable .. shall be common highways and forever free to citizens of the United States without any tax, duty, impost or toll therefor. Art II Sec. 2. Hunting and fishing and the taking of game and fish are a valued part of our heritage that shall be forever preserved for the people and shall be managed by law and regulation for the public good Art. XIII, 12

Matters What They SayNew MexicoThe protection of the states beautiful and healthful environment is hereby declared to be of fundamental importance to the public interest, health, safety and the general welfare. The legislature shall provide for control of pollution and control of despoilment of the air, water and other natural resources of this state, consistent with the use and development of these resources for the maximum benefit of the people. Article 20, Section 21

Matters What They SayPennsylvania

The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvanias public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.

Article 1, Section 27 of the

PA Supreme Court Our right to pure water, clean air and a healthy environment is inherent and indefeasible and must be protected for present and future generations.Robinson Township, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, et al v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania., Dec. 19, 2013

Website:www.delawareriverkeeper.orgBlog: delawarerivervoice@blogspot.comTwitter: DelRiverkeeperFacebook: Maya.K.van.Rossum orDelaware.Riverkeeper.Network

**Delaware River Watershed represents less than a half percent of the US land area (13,539 square miles) yet it provides 5% of the US population with water. This includes 7 million (up to 9 at times) people in New York City and 8 million people downstream on the Delawareat least 15 million people. PA comprises the largest land mass in the DR Watershed. New York is next to the smallest land mass but controls about 28% of the rivers flow with its water supply reservoirs in the Catskills.

Rt to free speechRt to bear armsRt to remain silentFreedom of religionBecause not heard about envtl rts envt taken advantage of*In the 1930s and 1940s, Its estimated that two to three million tons of sulfuric acid was dumped into the Ohio River near Pittsburgh every year by coal mining

Pennsylvania exempted coal mines from water pollution regulations allowing them to dump their wastes directly into surface waters. *In 1800s historians say nearly all of PA clearcutA state that 90% forested when european settlers arrived

Throughout the 1800s, timber barons cut down nearly all of Pennsylvanias forests. They were joined by the charcoal industry; an ironworks furnace cleared roughly an acre of trees every day to make charcoal, a key ingredient in the iron making process. *The worst industrial air pollution accident occurred in Donora, Pennsylvnia in 1948 killed 20 people and 7,000 people became ill, about half the towns population,fumes from a zince smelter blanketed a town for 4 days. The smog was a mix of sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, and heavy metal dust.

*By the mid 1960s, close to 3,000 miles of streams and over 10,000 acres of reservoirs were affected by acid mine pollution in Pennsylvania.Enduring pollutin*Result, -- the river began to react and its abundance to decline.By 1950sDock workers ill and in some cases died from illness such as cholera and yellow feverSmell from a planeClogged boat enginesPeeled paint off of boatsOxygen dead zone 20 miles River began to lose abundant commercial shad fishery that once among most vibrant and profitable a major industry on the River with catches ranging from 9 to 19 million pounds declined dramatically. Oysters once harvested at over 2 million pounds a year, now yielded less than half that amount.

*Fish kills*Not just public lands all envts

*influx of truck traffic (1,400 up to 4,000 truck trips per frack, 5 to 6 wells per pad, multiple fracks per well),air pollution from diesel fueled equipment and vehicles; 24/7 construction during extraction and fracking bringing light, noise and air pollution, lasting weeks at a time,

***Many pathways to water contamination Not a matter of if but whenNot if but when myers said could be as little as 10 years, rubin says with failing casings could be under a year.

*Pits are a source of contamination to air, land and waterPoor perf and oversight (speed and frenzy, violations , inadequate enforcement)Regulations DRBC, NY, PA and now Act 13Unmet challenges Rubin will cover aquifer impacts and the intrinsically polluting nature of fracking and drilling. Every aspect of nat gas development poses negative impacts that either cannot be avoided due to unavoidable conditions or are not addressed by current technology.

*The secret status of frack fluids under the Safe Drinking Water Act exemption led to complications, for instance, in Dimock Twp, Susquehanna County where frack fluid spilled into the Stevens creek, killing fish, and responding emergency officials couldnt find out exactly what was in the fluid from Halliburton who was conducting the fracking on the site, but MSDS sheets at the site listed chemicals classified as "potential carcinogens". While the material was removed from the land, it was not removed from the wetlands, exposing wetland plants and aquatic life and downstream water supplies to the chemicals in the frack fluid. There was a fish kill in Stevens Creek as a result; this may have been avoided if the emergency crews knew right off how deadly to fish the fluids were and fast action to remove all of it could have been taken. NOVs were issued by PADEP; Cabot, after 3 spills in one week, was ordered to stop frack operations, although they could still drill new wells; in Nov. DEP allowed them to resume fracking operations after resubmitting some pollution prevention plans which apparently were inadequate. Cabot was fined $150,000 by PADEP for polluting 13 water wells and nine square miles of aquifer in Dimock after methane escaped from one of their gas wells and polluted nearby water supplies, after blowing up one neighbors well in the middle of the night and forcing many homes off their wells and onto trucked in water, which they are still using after 2 yrs. while payoffs and settlements are being worked out. PADEP promised them a water line to import clean water but that has fallen through, leaving residents disraught. Residents in Dimock filed a class action law suit against Cabot for polluting their wells and environmental damages as they do not feel, that PADEP has done enough. Other examples: Clearfield County blowout, 2,486 violations that have been reported by DEP in the 2010 timeframe--drilled 2,755 natural gas wells.The FRAC Act has been introduced in the House and Senate to undo the exemption. Action Alerts on back table.And the problems have continued, if not worsened. The truth is Pennsylvania is simply not prepared to regulate, monitor and enforce the current wave of gas well development and with the breakneck speed of gas well installation in the state, more pollution incidents are occurring. Presently, only a handful of inspectors are employed to oversee the entire states oil and gas drilling activity. Tghere are only 15 DEP inspectors overseeing all the new gas wells going in and DEPs budget has just been cut by the legislature by 30%.

***Studies show 4 to 9% loss of the gas at the well field gas mainly methane1 to 10 % lost in transmission and storage*8-02-12 springs flowing orangeEd aaron*All this proliferrration not enough for corbett wanted more*More litigation to set good precedentBjt more than about the lawyers and orgsWe all have a role*How bring pronouncements to life?1st -- Embrace idea -- healthy environment is A RIGHT expect it!____________________Next -- Ensure governments local and state level:*Make sure government:understand obligation -- Must consider envtl impacts - substantive & meaningful way fulfill obligations to protect envtl rts -- While strive to accomplish other goals must protect envtl rts 3) Not mean protection environment trump all decisions -- Still other valuesBut while strive for and achieve other goals Must strive for and achieve environmental protection not one or other how do both

*Doesnt just apply to shale gas extraction to all issues*Not just big issues but little ones too incremental harms*Inspire similar provisions in other states so can have a movement across the nationWhere dont have get Where have make them stronger

*Remember these rts inherent and indefeasible not giiven by law so we have no matter where we live**