Health Impacts

Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA

New EARTHWORKS “Study” of Marcellus Health Effects in PA
October 19, 2012October 19, 2012

Oh lookie here. A new “research study” (full copy embedded below) has just been released by the extreme environmental anti-drilling group EARTHWORKS that says residents in Pennsylvania who live near Marcellus Shale drilling have a “pattern of health symptoms associated with oil and gas development.”

Let’s use the same standard they use to judge such studies, shall we? If any of the study’s authors have, at any point in time since birth, ever had anything to do with an anti-drilling organization, the study is instantly discredited. That’s the standard used for studies and research that are favorable to shale gas drilling—if the author of such a study has had any experience in the drilling industry, that study is tainted and must be expunged from the public discourse (see this MDN story about the University at Buffalo study and this MDN story about the University of Texas study).

The three authors of this so-called study either work for, or are related to, the enviro-left. So why wouldn’t we apply the same standard here?

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Health Impacts | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

PA Senate Leader Proposes Marcellus Drilling Health Panel
September 26, 2012September 26, 2012

Pennsylvania President Pro Tempore of the State Senate, Joseph Scarnati (a Republican), is drafting a bill to create a nine-member shale drilling health panel to study possible health and safety impacts from Marcellus Shale natural gas drilling. A new health panel was one of the proposals made last year by Gov. Tom Corbett’s Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission.

According to the Scranton Times Tribune:

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Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Research | Statewide NY

What Will a NY Fracking Health Study Actually Study?
September 24, 2012September 24, 2012

Just what do anti-drilling groups in New York that want a “health impact study” propose to study? How exactly do they think fracking may impact the health of New Yorkers, especially since chemicals don’t leak up to the surface as they sometimes (erroneously) claim? Get this: they want to study potential links between fracking and STDs, homelessness and lack of exercise. Yeah, certifiable wackos.

From an unattributed opinion piece in the New York Daily News (which is not a pro-fracking newspaper):

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Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

Bad to Worse in NY: Martens Invokes Another Delay for SGEIS
September 21, 2012September 21, 2012

The news in New York on the future of drilling has just gone from bad to worse. True to form, and as MDN has been telling your for more than a year now, Joe Martens—the Commissioner of New York’s Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC)—has once again delayed the release of new drilling rules for the state. As near as MDN can tell, the delay is indefinite—certainly until well into 2013.

Issuing a press release yesterday (read it below), Martens says he’s requested NYS Health Commissioner Nirav Shah to conduct a “health impact analysis” of hydraulic fracturing before the DEC will release new drilling rules. Here’s the (sad, maddening, tragic) press statement from fox-in-henhouse Martens:

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Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

More Details Leak on Secret DEC Meeting with Enviro Groups
September 10, 2012September 10, 2012

Anti-drilling book author and former Gannett reporter Tom Wilbur, who blogs about Marcellus Shale drilling here, still has his sources in Albany. And those sources tell him that Gov. Cuomo remains undecided about releasing new drilling rules for New York (called the SGEIS). They also told him more details about the recent secret meeting held by the Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and virulently anti-drilling groups, a meeting where more delays were discussed, favorably, as it turns out:

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Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

NY DEC Continues Secret Meetings with Anti-Drilling Groups
September 5, 2012September 5, 2012

It’s now after Labor Day and still no word about a release of new drilling rules in New York State from the Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC). Last week MDN passed along word from the Joint Landowners Coalition of New York (JLCNY) sounding the alarm that Gov. Cuomo was being pressured to postpone a decision on releasing new fracking rules until after the November election (see this MDN story).

We may now know why they sounded the alarm. In what appears to be a troubling trend, the DEC continues to have informal (we would call them secret) meetings with anti-drilling environmentalist organizations, like the Sierra Club, NRDC and Riverkeeper. If the DEC were doing this with landowner groups there would be an outcry from those very same organizations. At any rate, the latest attempt by anti-drillers to stall the release of fracking rules seems to center on the call for yet another study—this one on potential so-called health affects from drilling.

From the New York Times late last week:

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Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Economic Impact | Energy Companies | Health Impacts | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Susquehanna County

Cabot Effort Raises $4.4 Million for PA Physicians Clinic [Free]
September 5, 2012September 5, 2012

Earlier this year, Cabot Oil & Gas committed to donate up to $2 million to help fund building a new physicians clinic and hospital for the Montrose, PA area (see this MDN story).

This is “the rest of the story” as Paul Harvey used to say. Cabot indeed contributed an initial $1 million and then worked hard to encourage others to give. Local businesses and organizations like the VFW stepped up with big contributions and gave $1.2 million on top of Cabot’s initial $1 million. Cabot then went above and beyond, matching their donations with another $1.2 million! In addition, the Weinberg Foundation wrote a check for $1 million too. Total raised? $4.4 million. (Be sure to watch the video below.)

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Health Impacts | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

Much-Ballyhooed Marcellus Health Impact Study Not Funded
September 4, 2012September 4, 2012

MDN recently reported on the big story that two large health care systems are working together to conduct what is believed to be the first widespread health impact study of residents living in areas where there is active Marcellus drilling (see this MDN story). The two health care systems, Guthrie Health and Geisinger Health System, serving a combined 2.4 million patients, have good intentions. But now comes the word they don’t have the money (yet) to conduct the study. Oops. That’s embarrassing.

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Health Impacts | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

Health Care Systems Partner to Study Marcellus Impacts
August 21, 2012August 21, 2012

Guthrie Health, a regional health care provider in northeastern Pennsylvania and southern New York serving 200,000 residents in 11 counties, along with Geisinger Health System, serving 2.6 million residents in 44 counties in northeastern and central Pennsylvania, have joined forces to study the health impacts of Marcellus Shale drilling.

Using medical records of their patients who live near drilling, preliminary results of the study on how drilling may (or may not) affect asthma, cardiovascular disease and cancer are targeted to be released sometime next year, while other data will take longer—up to 15 years.

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