From NRDC, EarthJustice and Riverkeeper
Preliminary Suggestions for Comments on the
Draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (“DSGEIS”)
on Gas Development in the Marcellus Shale
October 25, 2009
Comment Period
The comment period should be extended for at least another 60 days,
preferably 180
Formal Rulemaking
DEC has been relying on permit applications, forms, and conditions to
supplement regulations that have not been updated since 1985.
By avoiding formal rulemaking, DEC keeps discretion to grant exceptions
from its usual standards on a case‐by‐case basis, without any public
oversight.
Discretionary standards are inadequate measures to mitigate potentially
significant adverse environmental impacts from high‐volume hydraulic
fracturing.
We need a formal rulemaking to ensure transparent, consistent, state of
the art, and enforceable standards that will provide an environmental
floor below which the gas development industry may not operate.
State and Local Agency Resources
DEC does not have adequate resources with which to review permit
applications, investigate facts, prepare environmental analyses,
develop permits, conduct inspections, review forms and reports, respond
to complaints, and enforce regulatory requirements and permit
conditions.
DEC should not be imposing administrative duties on local governments,
such as local health departments, without ensuring that permit fees
cover the localities’ costs.
Through severance taxes, permit fees, and other mechanisms, the gas
development industry should fully finance the costs of all
administrative and enforcement activities.
Environmental Justice
There is no analysis whatsoever of the potential for siting facilities
with adverse environmental impacts, such as compressor stations and
wastewater treatment
facilities, in low‐income communities or communities of color where
polluting facilities are already over‐represented.
The DSGEIS should describe what steps have been taken to consult with
Indian Nations, as required by DEC policy.
Cumulative Impacts
The DSGEIS improperly fails to evaluate the potential cumulative
impacts of gas drilling throughout the Marcellus Shale, claiming, in
effect, that it is too difficult to estimate the rate at which drilling
will proceed on a regional or statewide basis.
Although it may be difficult to predict precisely the rate and location
of development throughout the Marcellus, DEC must develop and evaluate
a reasonable worst‐case scenario and identify mitigation measures to
address any significant adverse impacts.
Instead of following this established practice, the DSGEIS evaluates
potential impacts on a “unit”, i.e., well pad, basis. This results in a
gross underestimation of the potential regional or statewide impacts
that could result from full development of the shale.
One example is the failure to consider regional ozone impacts, although
we know that localities in other states in which similar technologies
are being employed (e.g., TX, WY) is the observance of first‐time
violations of national ozone emission standards.
Another example is the failure to consider the potential regional water
quality impacts from stormwater discharges from multiple drilling sites
within a single watershed.
Alternatives
The DSGEIS fails to evaluate any meaningful alternatives as required by
law.
DEC must provide a real analysis of one or more alternatives that would
phase (and possibly cap) permitting over time and in certain locations,
particularly with an eye toward mitigating cumulative impacts.
•
DEC should also give more serious consideration to an alternative that
would mandate the use of non‐toxic fracking fluids. It can use its
regulatory authority to compel provision of the necessary information
to evaluate such an alternative.
DEC should consider an alternative that requires the industry to prove
the safety of any additives before they are used for drilling or
hydraulic fracturing.
Induced Growth and Secondary Impacts
The DSGEIS fails to evaluate any growth induced by the project or any
secondary impacts, even though the draft explicitly recognizes that a
huge new Schlumberger 2
Water
DEC must require that industry disclose all of the chemicals in each
additive, and which additives are used at each well, so that meaningful
groundwater testing and monitoring can be done and health impact
assessments can be conducted.
DEC must provide an assessment of the cumulative impacts of modifying
and expanding current wastewater treatment plants or constructing new
plants.
No drilling should be permitted until DEC can establish that there is
adequate capacity for legal and safe treatment and disposal of all
wastewater.
The land area targeted for drilling by gas companies in the Marcellus
region include the Catskill and Delaware River watersheds, which serve
as the drinking water source for over 15 million people.
The DSGEIS falls short of ensuring adequate watershed protection
throughout New York State. In particular, DEC has left open the
possibility of drilling within the New York City Watershed, the
unfiltered drinking water supply for more than 9 million New Yorkers
that is recognized around the globe as the model for watershed
protection.
Air
DEC does not conduct an assessment of regional ozone impacts from
drilling, nor does it conduct a regional (or cumulative) assessment of
emissions of any other criteria pollutant under the Clean Air Act.
DEC relies on air modeling that assumes that only one drilling rig
would be on a site at a time, but, in other parts of the DSGEIS, states
that there could be multiple rigs operating at the same time to drill
wells on a single well pad. DEC must either model the potential air
quality impacts associated with operation of more than one rig per well
pad or expressly prohibit simultaneous use of multiple rigs.
Traffic
DEC has provided no analysis of traffic impacts, even though it
recognizes that gas development will vastly increase usage of heavy
trucks.
It is not good enough to tell localities to negotiate a road plan with
industry.
Noise
DEC must provide a quantitative analysis of noise impacts.
Community Character
Industrial gas drilling brings with it a whole host of activities that
would be inconsistent with protecting the social character of upstate
communities, including impacts that will result from deforestation,
roadbuilding, wastewater disposal, surface water runoff, air pollution,
noise, and truck traffic.
Reports from around the country show that industrial gas drilling
operations have the potential to permanently change the face of rural
towns, creating “fractured communities” where the traditional way of
life has been transformed by industrialization and environmental
contamination.
Economic Costs
The DSGEIS fails to assess the economic value of preserving community
character, including the benefits derived from intact forest and
wetland ecosystems, including the services such ecosystems provide in
terms of clean air, clean water, tourism, fishing, and a whole host of
other recreational activities.
The DSGEIS does not adequately address the wide range of economic costs
associated with possible environmental contamination from industrial
gas drilling, such as the potential costs of constructing, operating,
and maintaining a filtration system for the Catskill‐Delaware drinking
water supply system in the event that contamination threatens New York
City’s current filtration avoidance determination.
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