Statement by the Board of Downwinders at Risk Regarding the Use of Natural Gas as a Transportation Fuel

Over the last four years, the board has received many grant proposals that promote the use of natural gas as a transportation fuel. We selected two of these for funding: a bus owned by the “T” fueled by Compressed Natural Gas that ferries workday Arlington commuters to and from the Ft. Worth Intermodal Center, and approximately 20 conversions of DFW area taxis from gasoline to CNG fuel for Cowboy Cabs.

We’re proud of these projects, which have taken cars off the road and produced less pollution per vehicle mile than their gasoline-powered counterparts. But recent events have compelled us to weigh not just this desirable end result, but the entire natural gas fuel cycle, in considering the projects that we believe will truly result in better DFW air quality and improved public health.

In doing so, it’s become impossible to ignore the incongruity of the claims of a “cleaner” natural gas industry, versus the facts on the ground in our own backyard. Among the most important of those facts are:

1) The natural gas industry is poorly regulated.
Gas drilling and extraction has broad exemptions from all federal environmental regulation, including the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and Superfund laws. These exemptions have allowed natural gas producers to pursue wasteful and polluting practices that would otherwise be illegal for other industries. Moreover, state regulatory agencies are woefully under-funded and under-staffed to be able to sufficiently monitor the facilities already operating.  The regulatory system must catch-up to the industry.

2) The gas industry is adding to local air pollution problems.
Barnett Shale gas activities have been found to contribute as much ozone-forming pollution as the entire inventory of vehicles in the North Texas area. Greenhouse gases and toxic air pollution are also produced in large volumes. Hazardous levels of pollution have been recorded near gas drill sites and compressor stations. In North Texas, natural gas is causing more air pollution than it’s preventing. “Green completion” technology should be mandatory throughout the natural gas fuel cycle.

3) The gas industry is consuming and contaminating large quantities of water.
Each drill site can consume 1 to 6 million gallons of water upon completion. That water can become contaminated with toxic chemicals that are injected for the purposes of “fracking,” or separating the gas from the Shale. Afterwards, each gas well can be “fracked” repeatedly over its lifetime, consuming another 2-5 million gallons of water every time. Water recycling should be mandatory and we support the passage of H.R. 2766, the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act of 2009. Like the Boy Scouts, gas producers need to leave the places they’re intruding on cleaner than they found them. 

4) The gas industry is abusing private property rights.
Currently, surface property owners have few rights to protect their homes or land from damage when a third party exploits mineral rights or eminent domain. There must be a balance of interests between those who are using the surface to build homes and those who own the mineral rights underneath those homes.

Natural gas could play an important and constructive role in the transition from coal and oil to more sustainable energy sources. But for it to do so, it must be extracted and processed with less waste and pollution. Until more modern methods are adopted and applied in the Barnett Shale, the board of Downwinders at Risk will not be funding any new projects through the Sue Pope Fund that promote the use of natural gas, and supports a moratorium on new natural gas industry permits in the Barnett Shale.

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THE SUE POPE FUND
NORTH TEXAS POLLUTION REDUCTION PROGRAM
PO Box 763844
Dallas, TX 75376
Office 972.296.9400 - Fax 972.296.9492 - Email