Frack Caution

To start off I'm going to explain some of the fracking process, and then I'm going to discuss some issues that result from fracking that isn't widely covered in the media.

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is the process of drilling down and horizontally underground and pumping massive amounts of water (up to millions of gallons per well!), proppant (sand and other debris), and chemical cocktail under extreme pressure to break up rock in order to release natural gas or oil to be captured for fuel. This method is supposed to be cleaner than coal because when burned it releases only half of the greenhouse gases (GHGs), and thus is considered a potential "transition" fuel towards alternative energy.

The process pumps down massive amounts of water that then comes back up as contaminated flowback or produced water. This water is then supposed to be stored at the drill site in tanks or in a pit dug into the ground until it can be either brought to a waste water treatment plant, like a local municipality, or is injected into an underground well. So it's supposed to be treated at a plant and then put back into surface water like a river or just pumped back into the ground, away from drinking sources, and left for good.

This seems almost all fine and dandy and is what you can find out by reading the EPA's website. (The EPA is known for having a rocky reputation, from who is running it to what they have allowed the oil industry to get away, with making the public question its integrity.)

What they don't tell you...

According to Butler in "The Energy Reader" if you look at the overall process of fracking there are many points at which methane gas, which is released from the rock, escapes and is lost into the atmosphere at many points. This released methane gas is a GHG that is 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide, so the life-cycle analysis of fracking would conclude that natural gas is not better than coal in terms of environmental impact.

Methane is a greenhouse gas that is 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.

What I found disturbing are the suspected pollution of groundwater and health impacts on the communities surrounding fracking wells. The flowback water contains proppant debris and the chemical cocktail it was pumped with, but it also includes other substances that were also released from the rock. The rock used to be ocean bedrock and releases super concentrated ocean brine, benzene, heavy metals, and radioactive materials that then flows back up the hole and to the surface with flowback. There is already a huge issue with what to do with nuclear radioactive waste because it will last thousands of years and we're running out of safe storage for it. Now we're pushing another largescale practice that also results in radioactive waste? What are we going to do with it?

And that chemical cocktail I keep mentioning? There's a reason why I haven't listed what's in it, because it hasn't been released to the public. Apparently, the oil industry claims proprietary rights over the chemical mixture they use during fracking and thus refuses to release that information to the public or environmental agencies.

Now they claim that the industry disposes of this used water properly, but that can't be right because the technology to transform this water back to drinkable water doesn't exist. Locally, there is huge potential for a mistake to be made and for them to contaminate drinking water, in which case responders and health professionals wouldn't know what they were dealing with. On a broader scale, if you know anything about how the water table works (of which I know the basics from speaking with an expert at my hometown meeting over another issue) then you know that water that is put into the ground doesn't just stay there. The water gets filtered through the layers of soil and gradually moves toward water bodies until it releases back into a river and the ocean; it's a constant slow filtering process that's part of the water cycle. Injecting super concentrated and contaminated water into our ground doesn't seem like the brightest idea when the world already has a shortage of clean drinking water; and that's their proper disposal method.

The technology to transform this water back to drinkable water doesn't exist.

During Earth week earlier this year I went to a presentation by Yuri Gorby, an RPI professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering, on his research with fracking communities in this country. A lot of information stayed with me from his presentation, including the fact that the fracking sites aren't well monitored or regulated. That or the drivers are being told break their practices by driving down an empty rural road and DUMPING the flowback water as they go. Professor Gorby described instances where he could follow the runoff stream of flowback water that ran from a fracking site right down the road to a local farm! What seemed to be another common practice was something called "flairing" which is the practice of lighting the gas and contaminants escaping the well om fire and just letting it burn. When this occurs for hours on end he described how you would step outside and taste the chemicals in your mouth. Many, if not most, of the residents in these fracking communities had recently come down with many of the same symptoms having to do with the water and air quality. It was so bad that families actually filled the cracks in their homes like people in during the Dust Bowl had to in order to keep the chemical filled air out. That is, if they didn't move out of town altogether. And try selling your house for a reasonable price or at all when buyers in the area know of the problems; the value of these people's homes have decreased because it's so bad.

Sound familiar? If you watch the mainstream media it wouldn't be. Only within the past couple of weeks has a Yale study been published in Environmental Health Perspectives (a journal of the National Institutes of Health) reporting that people living closer to fracking wells report more health symptoms than those living farther away. This is finally starting to raise awareness over the suffering of these communities and also raise public concern over the potential human exposure to chemicals and toxins created by fracking practices.

Yale study shows people living closer to fracking wells report more health symptoms than those living farther away.

This is why there are communities that are trying to ban fracking in their area, across the country, and around the world. Germany is in a position where they would seem to benefit from fracking because they have the resources, their infrastructure is very well set up for it, they are in need of more domestic energy production, and they want to stop relying so heavily on Russia. With all that in mind, it's a pretty big deal that Germany has a 7-year ban on fracking, either because their government decided to listen to the public outcry over it, or they were honest when they said they don't know enough about the risks involved and are proceeding with caution. This is called the 'Precautionary Principle', where if people and the government feel that the science hasn't provided enough information or knowledge to prove something is safe then they won't go ahead with it until they do. What a concept huh?

The US largely ignores precaution and takes action based on 'risk management'. In this case, if the US chooses to continue to ignore problems with fracking, then it sends the message that the US says 'frack' caution. Hopefully, with more reports published on the negative effects of fracking and the banning of fracking spreading, more countries including the US will look around with constructive criticism and move forward with caution.

Word Count: 1,283

Sources:

• Butler, T. (2012). The Energy Reader: Overdevelopment and the Delsuion of Endless Growth. (T. Butler, D. Lerch, & G. Wuerthner, Eds.) (p. 121, 175-178). Canada: Foundation for Deep Ecology, Post Carbon Institute, Watershed Media.
• Germany Bans Fracking. (2014, July 8). Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://online.wsj.com/articles/germany-bans-fracking-1404763231
• US EPA, OA, OEAEE, O. (2014). The Process of Hydraulic Fracturing. Retrieved September 19, 2014, from http://www2.epa.gov/hydraulicfracturing/process-hydraulic-fracturing
• Zeltner, B. (2014, September 10). Residents living nearer natural gas wells report more health symptoms, Yale study says. Cleaveland.com. Retrieved from http://www.cleveland.com/healthfit/index.ssf/2014/09/residents_living_nearer_natura.html#incart_river

Leading up to the People's Climate March

Original thoughts posted on September 12, 2014:
 If you haven't already heard, there is a mobilization occurring for the People's Climate March on Sunday September 21, 2014 in New York City. Along with other students and concerned citizens, I will being going down on a bus provided by RPI, and I'm excited! This will be the first large demonstration I've ever taken part in, and from looking at the flyer they posted on facebook below, it's going to be an enormous amount of people. To be honest it makes me a little worried... but I know that going will be worth it.

The People's Climate March is to bring people that recognize in diverse ways that climate change and global warming is a major issue. The march was planned on Sunday to coincide with the UN Climate Summit being held with world leaders in NYC on Tuesday September 23. The point of the march is to bring awareness to the issue of climate change, all the issues that are involved in the systems around climate change, and to show the public that yes, the people are concerned and want our world leaders to stop debating and start acting. Now.

Leading up to this event, because I joined the event on facebook, I have been receiving updates on what the plans were, what I needed to prepare, transportation for how to get there and back, information on where I could stay, etc. This march was extremely well organized. I initially signed up because I had gotten an email from 350.org asking me to months ago, and being a big supporter of Bill McKibben's work raising awareness on climate change, I was in.

Then in my Energy Politics class we watched the film below called Disruption by Kelly Nyks & Jared P. Scott. I have watched a lot of movies and documentaries on environmental issues and sustainability, and I felt this movie was executed very well. The film went through the timeline of when scientists started notifying and advising officials that climate change was a serious issue and of when and how our government and the public started to really listen to them. It also told viewers when and why the People's Climate March was happening, the importance of a march, and went through a countdown of the days preceding the  I was extremely impressed by the quality and variety of experts that took part, including Naomi Klein, Chris Hayes, Bill McKibben, Dr. Heidi Cullen, Van Jones, Dr. James Hansen and more. Not surprisingly it was made by the same team that made 'Do the Math' for 350.org.

There were other events in NYC leading up to the march on Sunday, but since I am a student that lives up in Troy I had to rely on RPI's bus to bring us down. Otherwise I would have done more to contribute and would have gone to more events to show my support, and you have to question how these sort of things affect the outcome of a movement like this. Do people have the means to get there? Do they have other obligations they couldn't put off?

Word Count: 518

Political Turmoil and Energy Security

One of the headlines I saw this morning as I was checking my email was one from the Wall Street Journal titled "Sanctions Over Ukraine put Exxon at Risk". Now I am very bad at being able to keep foreign political issues straight, but I did some further reading and this is the gist of what I understand to be the current Ukraine crisis. Russia annexed a peninsula shaped part of Ukraine called Crimea after the Ukrainian Revolution, and ever since there has been unrest among different political affiliations in Crimea and Ukraine and the Russian government. To be honest after reading it for an hour, I know there are more issues involved here, such as issues with Syria and ISIS, but I can't seem to make sense of what is going on. However, for the points I want to make in this post I don't need to explain much.

One point I do want to make is that Ukraine's energy comes mostly from Russia through pipelines, and Ukraine has accused Russia of using this as political leverage over them. This is an example of underlying energy politics that plays into other political turmoil that I don't much hear about in the news... but then again that might just be me being late in joining the 'drinking in news with my coffee' club. 

The headline mentioned above is about how yesterday, Thursday September 11, 2014, President Obama announced that he will be supporting tougher economic sanctions on Russia to "protest what the US describes as Russia's illegal actions in Ukraine". These economic sanctions now interfere with a contract Russia signed 2 years ago with Exxon, a contract that was hoped to bring ties between US and Russia closer. Now it just puts Exxon in a sticky situation because they are being seen as buddy-buddy with Russia, just as Russia is being seen as making the Ukraine crisis worse by being uncooperative for the US. But the real issue for Exxon is that their chances of tapping the crude oil from the contract with Russia is looking slim. 

Being an environmentalist, this sounds like a blessing to me. Though I know I have high hopes, perhaps the postponement of Exxon being able to drill into Russia's crude will give Russia enough time to consider changing their fossil fuel energy policies. The Russian Federation is part of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) afterall, and they are meeting this November and at a Climate Summit in Paris in June 2015. 

What I keep wondering is how long it is going to take countries to wake up and realize that they should take these climate summits seriously. According to 350.org's 'Do The Math', we can only allow 565 of the 2,795 gigatons of current oil reserves to burn before our climate will be pushed over the 2 degree Celsius increase that will cause major changes to the way we live. How can governments and the oil industry keep turning a blind eye while claiming to be meeting to solve the same issue? Not to mention, fossil fuel sources can be stolen or hijacked and be sold to fund corrupt groups like what ISIS is currently doing. Renewable energy sources that are decentralized from the government and are more in the hands of the communities and people can't really be hijacked like that, and in that sense is a less risky investment. 

I am eager to see the effect the People's Climate March has on leaders and their future discussions at climate summits. Hopefully leaders won't be sidetracked by what's going on with Ukraine and with ISIS, but instead take it into account and think over how issues like these tie in to the future of energy security.

Word Count: 627

Sources:

• Baker, G. (2014). The 10-Point: Gerard Baker on Obama’s Allies, Exxon's Russian Oil Deal, UPS's Strategy and More - WSJ. Wall Street Journal. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://online.wsj.com/articles/the-10-point-gerard-baker-on-obamas-allies-exxons-russian-oil-deal-upss-strategy-and-more-1410519180?tesla=y
• BBC News - Ukraine crisis: Timeline. (2014, September 9). Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275
• Do the Math - Because We > Fossil Fuels. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://math.350.org/
• Flynn, A. (2014, September 12). Energy Journal: ExxonMobil’s Tricky Position in Russia - MoneyBeat - WSJ. Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2014/09/12/energy-journal-exxonmobils-tricky-position-in-russia/?KEYWORDS=oil+exxon

Divestment at RPI?

Last semester I had this idea kicking around that I wanted to start a divestment campaign on campus asking RPI to divest its endowment from fossil fuel based energy markets. I then came back to my reality and recognized that I had no time for my classwork or even cooking my groceries let alone extra-curricular activities. However, I am still intrigued by the notion of divestment at RPI and so, here is some idea of how that might look and how student bodies at other universities have accomplished this.

Divestment is when a large establishment that has a large amount of money to put into investment, be it a business, university, church, whatever, takes their money out of investing in fossil fuels and invests in something else. The reason divestment is such a huge issue is because the whole fossil fuel industry, that is polluting our atmosphere with greenhouse gases, spewing chemicals from fracking, ruining the gulf with oil spills, etc., is held financially stable with the money invested in it. There are divestment campaigns where students, churchgoers, and other community stakeholders rally and petition for divestment of their establishment because it doesn't make any sense to be preaching and teaching society on the issues of climate change while simultaneously backing oil companies. 

Some universities acknowledged that their investment portfolio wasn't reflecting their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investment criteria and agreed to divest. Stanford acknowledged this and divested from 100 coal companies, while other colleges like Harvard have been pleading for 40 years that narrowing their investment options could be financially risky for a return for the college. This is ironic because they are using business-as-usal (BAU) to dictate their portfolio instead of the current reality that the fossil fuel industry can be volatile due to major accidents, political tensions, or simply the resource running out. A more sound way to invest the money could be with the growing renewable energy market or to re-invest in improving the local community.

Coming back to RPI... The initial tidbit of information that made me so intrigued was that Shirley Ann Jackson, the President of RPI, is on the board for Marathon Oil Corporation and the energy company Public Service Enterprise Group Incorporated (PSEG), along with IBM, Medtronic Inc., and FedEx. How this woman manages all this is beyond me, props to her. However, I wonder if the student body of her university wanted RPI to divest, would it create a conflict of interest for her? This is where the digging of information began... 

And I came up really short. Turns out you can't just look up online how your university chooses to invest their endowment. That is why a divestment campaign can also become a campaign for more transparency so the public is informed and can hold the university accountable if the do agree to divest. I was able to get financial statements from a few years ago, but none of it gave information on the kinds of companies and industries RPI invested in. 

Instead, to my surprise I discovered a history of divestment at RPI. Around September and October of 2013, only one year ago, there was a small and short-lived divestment movement that rallied for RPI to "go fossil free". But... I was here a year ago and would have found that extremely exciting, so my guess is one of the issues they had with building support was getting the word out to the student body. I'm one of the few Sustainability Studies majors enrolled, and if I didn't know about this then they must not have done enough research and planning to gather momentum for this cause. Another issue they came up against was campus politics; their "Application to Hold a Peaceful Demonstration on Campus" had been denied. 

That's what much of a divestment campaign entails, organization of activists and campaign strategies. If I were to start a divestment campaign at RPI I would start by talking with people on the buses on the way down to NYC for the People's Climate March on Sunday, September 21st. I would purposefully take advantage of the increased awareness of climate change issues among the campus community. From there I would go to student majors and clubs affiliated with environmental sciences, sustainability, economic justice, and finance, and find a staff member that would be willing to provide guidance and support. Once everyone was gathered, the next step would be to draft a petition asking RPI to disclose its investment portfolio and divest from fossil fuels. It would be even better to set up a rally or educational event where maybe 350.org could visit campus, give a speech, and mention the petition to the crowd. Once there were enough signatures obtained and awareness raised, I would imagine the culmination would be to organize a meeting with RPI Officials to ask them if they are going to respond to the campus community and divest.

In 1988 RPI students campaigned and rallied for RPI to divest from South African companies that supported the Apartheid government. They submitted two demands: that RPI disclose the companies they were invested in and to divest from those doing business with the Apartheid government. The current acting President had returned with an agreement to disclose, but not divest. When you take a step back and look at the larger picture, that was still a victory. By the mid-1980's 155 campuses, 26 state governments, 22 counties, and 90 cities divested from companies doing business with South Africa. The overall divestment campaign helped to break up the Apartheid government.

Perhaps this Fossil Free Divestment campaign will help loosen King CONG's hold on the energy market and we will finally be able to usher in a new era of renewable energy and sustainable practices.

Word Count: 962
Sources:

• Fossil Free – Frequently Asked Questions. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://gofossilfree.org/frequently-asked-questions/
• NACUBO: Public NCSE Tables. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://www.nacubo.org/Research/NACUBO-Commonfund_Study_of_Endowments/Public_NCSE_Tables.html
• President’s Profile - Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://www.rpi.edu/president/profile.html
• PSS: Rensselaer Alumnus again calls for divestment; protested during Alumni Weekend events | The Rensselaer Polytechnic. (October 16, 2013). Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://poly.rpi.edu/2013/10/16/pss_rensselaer_alumnus_again_calls_for_divestment_protested_during_alumni_weekend_events/
• Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute: Go Fossil Free! | Fossil Free. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://campaigns.gofossilfree.org/petitions/rensselaer-polytechnic-institute
• The Long, Stubborn Fight with Universities over Coal, Oil, and Gas Divestment « Wade Rathke: Chief Organizer Blog. (September 10, 2014). Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://chieforganizer.org/2014/09/10/the-long-stubborn-fight-with-universities-over-coal-oil-and-gas-divestment/?utm_content=bufferb9c57&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
• Times Union - Albany NY. (January 25, 1988). Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://alb.merlinone.net/mweb/wmsql.wm.request?oneimage&imageid=5506547

Solarize Troy

Solarize Troy is a group of volunteers in Troy, New York that have come together with the goal of bringing solar panels to Troy residents at a reduced price. The concept is to gather community stakeholders and have them educate the community through local outreach, gather a group of interested buyers, collaborate to find a solar installer, and negotiate a lower price in exchange for the sheer volume of purchases. Basically, volunteers gather enough interested buyers in Troy to get a 'buy-in-bulk' discount from a solar installer of their choosing. The goal is to get a low enough price to provide the incentive for a large group to convert from fuel based energy sources to solar. 

Why would the solar companies go for this when they can find their own customers? It actually turns out that offering a lower is worth it for the solar companies because the solarize volunteers have already done a lot of the legwork involved in community outreach and marketing, not to mention the purchasers are already screened and informed interested buyers. This business model, known as a solarize purchasing cooperative, has been a success in the Southeast Portland community and others across the country.

Solarize Troy started with a former project manager for IBM some other locals that were already involved with Transition Troy and Transition Albany, other local initiatives that pursue adaptation for climate change and sustainability. The group came together as the 'steering committee' and reached out to residents to see who was interested. By June 2014 that had about 75 interested homeowners. The group then sent out a proposal to solar vendors that include not just specifics on pricing, but also product quality requirements and company responsibility. They got a handful of responses and after consideration chose RGS Energy, a regional provider based in Vermont. After the discounts RGS gave Solarize Troy and the government tax credits and rebates, it ends up being that the homeowners end up paying $6500 for a $30,000 panel. Not too shabby.

Incentives from the government coupled with Solarize initiatives like this spreading to communities across the county, professionals expect most homeowners to convert to solar energy within a few years. The way it will happen is that the demand for solar will be driven up, buying increases, and prices will eventually follow because the incentives will fade out. And that's exactly the point of the incentives and solarize initiatives, to increase demand across the country until those incentives aren't needed anymore to make solar energy viable for a larger audience in the market. There are skeptics, such as the Greenpeace activist Danny Kennedy, that believe the relationship between our government and regulated energy monopolies will push back against solar energy from taking over the market. In an interview Danny Kennedy calls these energy monopolies "King CONG" for the major corporations in the coal, oil, nuclear, and gas industry (I thought CONG was a brilliant name). Skeptics, including myself, think that the government isn't going to just let the solar industry grow and take over a lot of the market because a major shift to solar energy would disrupt the centralized power, shifting the power of the energy industry towards the people. However, I also agree with Danny K. when he said that a shift to solar is possible with enough "social will and political pressure" society can beat King CONG by being "smarter, better, and cheaper", and I think that is exactly what initiatives like Solarize Troy are accomplishing.

Word Count: 583
Sources:

• Kickstarting the Sun — Metroland. (Katelynn Ulrich). Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://metroland.net/2014/07/17/kickstarting-the-sun/
• Rooftop Revolution: How Solar Energy Is Putting Power Back in the Hands of the People | Alternet. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://www.alternet.org/environment/rooftop-revolution-how-solar-energy-putting-power-back-hands-people?page=0%2C1