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Concerned gas drilling would endanger drinking water for 15 million people

Thirty-nine New Jersey’s legislators have joined in a letter to the Delaware River Basin Commission opposing the agency’s proposed natural gas development regulations on the grounds the rules are premature and not based on sound science.

The legislators, all but one Democrats, requested that the DRBC maintain a moratorium on natural gas drilling in the basin until the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) completes a study that will assess the impacts drilling would have on the drinking water quality and quantity for over 15 million people and New Jersey‘s economy. The EPA study results are expected in 2012.

“New Jersey’s legislators are taking the first important step in protecting our drinking water,” Kate Millsaps, New Jersey Sierra Club program assistant, said Monday.

“Coupled with the package of fracking bills that are expected to be introduced before the Senate and Assembly environment committees next month, the Legislature is promoting policies that put natural resource protection, clean energy alternatives, and the public health and safety before corporate profits.”

The DRBC’s proposed rules would apply to all natural gas development in the basin, not just the Marcellus Shale. Two New Jersey shale deposits are located in the basin, the Utica Shale under the Kittatiny Ridge, and the Stockton Shale in Hunterdon and Mercer counties, which be developed under the proposed regulations.

In the letter, legislators expressed concerns over the storage and disposal of the chemical-laced wastewater that results from hydraulic fracturing, the drilling technique to be used in the basin. Millsaps said recent reports have found that the radioactive matter and other contaminants in the wastewater cannot be removed in sewage treatment facilities or fully diluted in our waterways. Under the proposed DRBC rules, wastewater would be sent to treatment plants that complete a treatment ability survey, although none have been approved yet.

The Senate and Assembly environment committees are expected to consider a package of bills including A3313/S2576 which calls for a ban on the use of hydraulic fracturing in New Jersey, and S2575/ A3314 which would prohibit any New Jersey member of the DRBC from supporting approval to withdraw water for hydraulic fracturing.

“The future of the Delaware River is at stake including the drinking water for approximately 3 million New Jersey residents. We are glad the New Jersey Legislature is standing up against these proposed rules that will not protect our state from the devastation that will result to our environment from fracking,” Jeff Tittel, New Jersey Sierra Club director, said. “We are glad the Legislature is standing up for our water, environment, and economy over special interests.”

The DRBC held one of three public hearings on the proposed rules Friday in Trenton. The public comment period ends March 16.

The draft regulations were issued over registered objections of a number of prominent officials, including Rep. Rush Holt, (D-N.J.) and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and numerous environmental and conservation organizations, people who have attended and spoken on the record at the public hearings and through at least 8,000 written comments submitted between April and December.

“The DRBC’s proposed rules do not meet the commission’s required legal mandate – to preserve the exceptional water quality and outstanding assets of the Delaware River, to protect our clean drinking water from degradation,” Delaware Riverkeeper Maya van Rossum said. “The rules were rushed out before the science was done and it shows. The public needs to speak up and remind the DRBC of its responsibility to Do No Harm.”

“It is unconscionable that risky gas drilling may be implemented in a region where 15 million people rely on clean, chemical-free drinking water. Instead of moving ahead hastily with inadequate regulations, the Delaware River Basin Commission needs to stop moving forward to allow drilling,” Karina Wilkinson, regional organizer for Food & Water Watch, a consumer watchdog group, said. “The only ones who benefit in the rush to drill are corporations that are destroying our communities in their quest for profit.”

The legislators who signed the letter to the DRBC are: Senators Bob Gordon, Stephen M. Sweeney, Barbara Buono, Diane B. Allen, Bob Smith, Loretta Weinberg, Joseph F. Vitale, Donald Norcross, Christopher Bateman, Paul Sarlo, Linda Greenstein, Sandra B. Cunningham, Fred H. Madden Jr. and Nia Gill and Assembly members Connie Wagner, Reed Gusciora, Joan M. Voss, Celeste Riley, John J. Burzichelli, John McKeon, Peter J. Barnes III, Linda Stender, Joan Quigley, Charles S. Mainor, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, Upendra Chivukula, Craig J. Coughlin, Pamela R. Lampitt, Caridad Rodriguez, Gordon M. Johnson, Bonnie Watson-Coleman, Angel Fuentes, Gilbert L. Wilson, Daniel R. Benson, Herb Conaway Jr., Jack Connors, Ralph R. Caputo, Annette Quijano, and Vincent Prieto.

For more information on natural gas: www.delawareriverkeeper.org.

-TOM HESTER SR., NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM