Devastating Critique of “Study” Linking Fracking to Health Issues
Yesterday MDN told you about a new “study” that reportedly links the presence of fracking with an increase in hospital visits for serious health issues, like heart conditions (see New Study Claims Marcellus Drilling Causes Serious Health Issues). We did a fast read of the research and explained our concerns about it, including the statement by the authors of the study themselves who admit the study doesn’t actually prove a thing. MDN friend Nicole Jacobs at Energy in Depth has done a deep dive and provides the following devastating critique of that study, including unearthing a video by one of the study’s authors which shows her as a full-throated anti-driller. That is, this “study” was a sham from the beginning, which was kind of our gut instinct when we spotted it…
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A new research study appearing in an online “journal” with very low standards, PLOS ONE, claims that hydraulic fracturing leads to an increase in hospitalization rates in the Marcellus Shale region. The research study, titled “Unconventional Gas and Oil Drilling Is Associated with Increased Hospital Utilization Rates” (full copy embedded below) on the surface appears to contain damning evidence. Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University looked at hospitalization records for three northeastern Pennsylvania counties from 2007-2011–Bradford, Susquehanna and Wayne. Both Bradford and Susquehanna counties have seen a huge amount of shale drilling over that period. Wayne County, on the other hand, has seen no shale drilling because of the intransigence of the Delaware River Basin Commission and their ongoing frack ban. The researchers say that people in Bradford and Susquehanna counties go to the hospital for serious heart conditions at a rate 27% higher than those in Wayne County. Ergo, there is a connection between fracking and health issues. We are fully in favor of rigorous academic research into issues like this one. But a few things bother us about this latest “fracking kills” study…
As MDN noted last Thursday, taking a break from being on break in breathtakingly beautiful Ogunquit, Maine, a group of Tioga County, NY landowners have painted Andrew Cuomo and his Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) in a corner with respect to fracking in the Empire State (see 
Wouldn’t you know? The very day that MDN goes on vacation, a HUGE story–at least for New York State–happens. So we’re back with a single posting today. Yesterday a press conference was held in the Town of Barton (Tioga County), NY to announce that a group of landowners flying under the name of The Snyder Farm Group (five families make up the group) have contracted with Tioga Energy Partners to drill a fracked Utica Shale well, and follow it up with drilling a fracked Marcellus Shale well, using liquefied petroleum gas (LPG or propane) and sand. The wells will not use water for fracking–and therefore, according to the landowners, avoid the ban on high volume fracking recently imposed by Andrew Cuomo and his underling Joe Martens at the state Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC). There is no doubt this is huge news throughout the state–and is giving heartburn to Cuomo and Martens. What cockamamie grounds can the DEC possibly use to refuse it? It’s a brilliant move by the landowners in Tioga County…
A day after issuing the final nail in the coffin of fracking in NY (see 
Let the lawsuits begin! Yesterday the anti-drilling, anti-fossil fuel head of the New York Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC), Joe Martens, did his master’s bidding (his master being Lord Andrew Cuomo, Earl of the Hamptons) by imposing an official, TEMPORARY (not permanent) ban on hydraulic fracturing in the Empire State. The document issued yesterday by Martens is called a Findings Statement (full copy below) and it provides the DEC’s official rationale for the action they are taking in not granting permits for high volume fracking in the state. News coverage is blaring the trumpets that New York has “banned” fracking. Well, yes, in a sense that’s true. But the implication is that it’s a permanent ban–which is not true. Far from it. Martens uses profoundly weak arguments in the Findings Statement to justify his political action. One of his central arguments is what fracking “may” do to water supplies. A few weeks ago the federal EPA, after four years of intense study, found fracking is perfectly safe for water supplies (see 
A researcher at Northwestern University, Dr. Fengqi You, believes he has found a way to make fracking more environmentally friendly by making some tweaks in the way things are done. Dr. You says first you need to remove trucks from the equation and use pipelines to get water to and from fracking sites. Second, You says don’t drill all of the wells at once in the same place–spread it out over time to reduce the impact on the environment. Finally, You says to recycle frack wastewater instead of trucking it to injection wells. Do those things, says Dr. You, and fracking is A-OK. There doesn’t seem to be anything particularly earth-shattering or new in You’s research. Or did we miss something?…
The Joint Landowners Coalition of New York (JLCNY) and JLC United will air another live session of the Good News Table Talk Radio Show this Sunday, June 28 from 7-8 pm on WNBF Radio 1290 in Binghamton (listen online at: