Have you seen the maps showing the fracking in Arkansas?

Wells-Western AR - 3/11 Credit: StopArkansasFracking.org

Have you seen the maps that show the number of natural gas wells using hydraulic fracking in central and western Arkansas? I certainly don't remember seeing them on front pages of the local papers or on the nightly news. As of May 2011, the Arkansas Oil & Gas Commission reported over 3,362 natural gas wells drilled in "The Natural State" and another 650 wells already permitted. The two maps of Central and Western Arkansas show the extent of hydraulic fracking  as of March 2011. (Click each map to enlarge) Each green dot shows an active well, already fracked and that may be fracked many times. The yellow dots are wells drilled but not yet fracked. The red dots are permitted well sites not yet drilled. The two maps show a lot of green dots that represent a lot of money and political influence.

Wells-Central AR - 3/11 Credit: StopArkansasFracking.org

Max Brantley, the Arkansas Times senior editor, has an cautionary post about natural gas fracking wells that suggests that Arkansas citizens should be more vigilant as more and more wells using hydraulic fracking spread across Arkansas. Brantley mentions Sam Lane of Greenbrier, AR, who has created a website with all sorts of information about fracking in central and western Arkansas. I followed the links to Lane's StopArkansasFracking.org.

Lane's home page contains a survey you can complete if you've experienced any water or other problems from the increased well drilling in your area. But the site also contains additional pages with common misconceptions about the industry, regulations,inspections, accidents and violations, drilling in Arkansas national forests, other reports,  videos and maps. Be prepared to spend a little time there. Curiosity may lead you from one link to another and Lane has gathered a number of examples and directions about how you can find even more information on the topic.

Old infantrymen tend to like maps so they can quickly get the lay of the land. I will freely admit that I had no idea of the extent of drilling being done north and south of I-40 in western Arkansas. A few friends who live to the east and south of us have reported feeling earthquakes, mostly slight tremors, in the past year. Then there was that earthquake over in Oklahoma earlier this year that was felt all the way into NW Arkansas and portions of the river valley near Fort Smith. You don't see many gas wells driving down I-40 and it's not like the old pictures of the oil boom when large numbers of oil wells were drilled side by side in great fields. Now drilling a well is much less visible unless you live close to one. 

Credit: FloridaMemory.com

As a young lad, I grew up around large corporate phosphate mining operations in Florida. I even worked to help build one or two of their plants during the summers while in college. When a friend asked his father, who was employed as a manager at one of the mines, about all the dust and air pollution, I heard him say, "Breathe deeply son, that's your source of income." So I know from personal experience what happened in the aftermath - after the companies have depleted the local resources and their profits decline and the cases of emphysema and lung cancer appeared years later, after the mines were closed.

Whether wide shallow hole or small deep hole, my concern, like Brantley's and Lane's, is what happens after the natural gas is again depleted and the web of corporations and their subsidiaries move on to more profitable areas. Who pays for the damage after they're gone. The answer is the people who breathed the polluted air or drank the contaminated water, or lost the use of their land. The same people who watched their friends get sick and die from the after-effects of polluted drinking water while their life savings were consumed by medical bills. Like the lessons learned in Florida 50 years ago and many other resource rich communities, the people in Arkansas will end up paying the major part of the bill for the corporations - the people in Arkansas who are left AFTER the corporations are long gone.

Draft EPA Report links contaminated groundwater to fracking operations...

Photo Credit: J. Schumacher

On December 8, 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency released a draft report of an investigation near Pavillion, Wyoming, that provides a direct link between fracking and contamination of ground water. Ars Technica writer Scott Johnson provides the story behind the graphs and data tables in the EPA's technical report at: http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/12/how-the-epa-linked-fracking-to-contaminated-well-water.ars/1   

Arkansas and Oklahoma are two of several states where companies currently drill for natural gas using a technique called hydraulic fracturing of rock layers deep in the ground to increase the release of natural gas. Both states have experienced an increased number of earthquakes and tremors in the last year or two, and residents in a growing number of locations in the U.S. where the fracking process is used have complained of contaminated ground water. Examples include flammable gas seeping into existing water wells or evidence of chemicals used during the injection process or held in waste fluid containment areas that seep into wells intended for drinking water. Drillers have maintained for years that there is no link between fracking operations and water contamination.

In Wyoming, the waste fluid pits were "clearly a source of shallow groundwater contamination. Benzene, for example, was detected in groundwater samples collected near the pits at concentrations 78 times the health standard." The EPA study also connected chemicals found in the deep monitoring wells, with those found in drinking water wells closer to the surface. In the end, more investigations are needed including the "collection of baseline data, greater transparency on chemical composition of hydraulic fracturing fluids, and greater emphasis on well construction and integrity requirements and testing."

However, the growing anecdotal and scientific evidence connecting fracking with drinking water contamination certainly calls into question the wisdom of exempting fracking fluids from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act and granting fracking operations as categorical exceptions in the 2005 Energy Policy Act.

All Americans want as much energy independence as we can safely obtain, but the good people of Wyoming or any other state shouldn't have to live with the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry recommendation to use alternate or treated water supplies as their source of drinking water or opening windows and ventilating their bathrooms while showering to prevent any possibility of explosive hazards caused by accumulating methane. Who knows, safety in Wyoming may someday come down to no balsam scented candles while soaking in a hot tub, but nobody wants drilling companies messing with their drinking water! 

The 121 page EPA draft report, which will undergo peer review and a period of public comment, is available at: http://www.epa.gov/region8/superfund/wy/pavillion/

 FROM: Scott K. Johnson, "How the EPA linked "fracking" to contaminated well water," ArsTechnica.com, 12/09/11. Available online: http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/12/how-the-epa-linked-fracking-to-contaminated-well-water.ars/1

For more information about Ars Technica, see: http://arstechnica.com/site/about-ars-technica.ars  RSS feeds and weekly newsletters available if you're interested.

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What are the facts on jobs and debt?

It's easier today to get to the facts regarding the claims of Tea Party candidates, like Newt Gingrich, who consistently claim President Obama and Democrats killed jobs in manufacturing and that Democrats are the ones to blame for trillions in national debt. You can read and compare the numbers without any additional comments on my part. You can also follow the links in the citations if you need more background information and interpretation.

Barack Obama: Increase of 157,368 manufacturing jobs per year in office
George W. Bush: Decrease of 434,143 manufacturing jobs per year in office
Bill Clinton: Increase of 37,143 manufacturing jobs per year in office
George H.W. Bush: Decrease of 336,000 manufacturing jobs per year in office
Ronald Reagan: Increase of 1,429 manufacturing jobs per year in office
Jimmy Carter: Increase of 15,333 manufacturing jobs per year in office

FROM: John Aravosis, "Guess which presidents killed manufacturing jobs in the last 20 years? Their names are Bush," AMERICAblog, Dec. 6, 2011. Available online: http://www.americablog.com/2011/12/guess-which-presidents-killed.html

"Newt Gingrich says Barack Obama has killed jobs in energy, manufacturing," Politifacts.com, Dec. 5, 2011. Available online: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2011/dec/06/newt-gingrich/newt-gingrich-says-barack-obama-has-killed-jobs-en/

As to which presidential administrations created most of the national debt:

GOP Presidents    Democratic Presidents
$9.5 trillion               $3.8 trillion

Total debt is $14.3 trillion.
$1 trillion of debt comes from before Reagan
(NYT doesn't make clear who created that debt).
$13.3 trillion accumulated from Reagan to Obama.

71% of the $13.3 trillion was under GOP presidents.
28% of the $13.3 trillion was under Dem presidents.

(Source: NYT pieced together data from Treasury, OMB, Federal Reserve Bank of NY, and more)

PS And before anyone says "you have to look at who controlled Congress," I don't recall the Republicans worrying about that fact when they blamed Obama for the deficit and the national debt.

What's more, I also don't recall any Republican presidents vetoing the debt ceiling increase during their tenure. In fact, many of the biggest causes of the national debt were GOP presidential initiatives, such as:

* Reagan defense budgets and tax cuts
* George HW Bush gulf war
* George W Bush tax cuts, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

As for Democratic Presidents, you have Bill Clinton who actually put us in a surplus - which George Bush immediately blew on a... wait for it... tax cut - and Barack Obama who inherited the biggest economic downturn since the Great
Depression (thus you can't blame him for that, just as I don't include the three Bush recessions or the Reagan recession in the early 80s).

FROM: John Aravosis,  "71% of national debt happened during GOP presidencies; 28% under Dem presidents," AMERICAblog, July 28, 2011. Available online: http://www.americablog.com/2011/07/71-of-national-debt-happened-during-gop.html

The problem with the national debt is that the last three Republican administrations financed three major wars and huge tax cuts for their wealthy friends on our national credit card while helping multinational corporations export American jobs instead of American made products.

Thanks for two blog posts from John Aravosis, Editor of AMERICAblog, and a fact-checking by Politifact.com, a site dedicated to checking the accuracy of politicians and pundits sponsored by the Tampa Bay Times. I don't always agree with all of the political positions of all the authors and blogs that I read, but these two short factual items may help cut through the "heifer dust" being added to the political compost pile and get a lot closer to the hard facts.

"Republicans love the 'truth' but they hate 'facts.'" - Bill Maher

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Wakulla Springs is one of Florida's "Special Places."

Thanks to Jim Stevenson, former chief biologist for Florida State Parks and Audubon supporter for nominating Wakulla Springs State Park for designation as on of Florida's "Special Places." You can read more about the nomination and what Jim said about Wakulla Springs State Park on the Florida Audubon's News Blog.

I'm not sure when I first visited Wakulla Springs, but the old high wooden dock was still in use and jumping or diving off the highest level was almost considered a rite of passage for all young boys who dared climb to the very top. Take my word for it. It was a long way down when you're only a few feet tall.

I visited Wakulla Springs while a student at Florida State and later stayed in the Wakulla Springs Lodge rather than a Tallahassee motel when visiting the state capitol on business. Later I had the chance to retire and Katy and I selected Wakulla County, primarily because of the springs, park and the beautiful Wakulla River.

Although we later retired a second time to Western Arkansas, Wakulla Springs State Park is still in our heart as one of our personal "Special Places" to visit when I'm back in Florida. A very special thank you to Jim Stevenson for nominating the park for such a recognition, and Ron Piasecki, current President and all of the Friends of Wakulla Springs State Park who have continued to work so tirelessly over the years to protect and preserve a national treasure.

Credit: FloridaMemory.com

UPDATED: 12/19/11 - The Friends of Wakulla Springs group recently sent out a reminder about a 4-minute video. "The Mastodon Findings at Wakulla Springs", that recounts how mastodon skeletons and early human artifacts have been found at the springs. Wakulla Springs has frequently been at the intersection of science and history. The Friends are working hard to help preserve Wakulla Springs for future generations.

UPDATED: 2/3/12 - A hat tip to Ron Plasecki and the Friends of Wakulla Springs for finding "The Development of Wakulla Springs" video on MyDaily, part of the AOL collection of news sites in the UK. The 12-minute video covers the park's early development by Ed Ball, early movies filmed at Wakulla Springs, the famous Florida State College for Women (later FSU) swimming team and the amphibious attack on Wakulla Springs with live ammunition used as a training film for the invasion of Europe during WWII. The color training film won an Oscar the following year. Thanks to the park/s many friends and supporters, Wakulla Springs evolved into one of the premier state parks and wildlife sanctuaries in the Florida panhandle.

Wakulla Springs basin in 2003. Click on image for larger view.

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