Many local organic farmers (ourselves included) have refused to sign gas
drilling leases, even though signing would have helped us pay our property
taxes. We lose the financial benefit of signing, yet we'll still have to
share the financial burden of the consequences, like road repair and clean
up of toxic spills if we can't hold the drilling companies accountable.
Worse yet will be sharing the adverse impacts on health that may force us to
relocate. With 7,000 new gas wells planned for this area, one study
predicted that the air quality here will degrade to the same level as Ft
Worth-Dallas, once you add the pollution from thousands of truck trips to
the drilling process itself.
Jan Quarles
Ovid, NY
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon Bosak" <[email protected]>
To: "Sustainable Tompkins County listserv"
<[email protected]>
Sent: Thursday, September 03, 2009 9:58 AM
Subject: [SustainableTompkins] Hydrofracking (was: Re: Drilling Pad Sizes)
- The social justice and local food supply implications of
denying income from gas leases to local farmers who are
desperately looking for ways to hang on to their land (and
while it's probably the least of our problems, I'll note that
the local sustainability movement stands to lose whatever
credibility it might have with these folks if it takes an
adversarial position that's not solidly supported by the facts)
So.... Let's tread carefully here. What I'm taking away from
this thread is the danger of undercutting our position by using
data from places that aren't directly comparable with ours.
I'm beginning to suspect that the most constructive goal would be
to control hydrofracking in a way that makes it proceed as slowly
as possible and with as little damage to the environment as
possible. Maybe we should be focusing on that.
Jon
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_______________________________________________
For more information about sustainability in the Tompkins County area, please
visit: http://www.sustainabletompkins.org/
RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for:
[email protected]
http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins
Questions about the list? ask [email protected]
free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org
