Health & Fitness
Fracking is about water, your rights and national security: DC Rally draws 4,000 people
Fracking is about depleting our water supply to get natural gas that is sold overseas. Our legislators gave the rights of property owners and city governments to the oil and gas industry.
Last Saturday 4,000 people from Ohio, New York, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and other states gathered in Washington D.C. and marched from the U.S.Capital Building to the headquarters of America's Natural Gas Alliance and American Petroleum Institute. I was there.
Our message? Stop hydrofracking.
Not forever. We may need that natural gas someday.
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But stop it now. Temporarily.
Stop it until we know:
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1. How to clean the water used for hydrofracking. Each frack uses from 2 to 9 million gallons of water. The process must start with CLEAN WATER; chemicals must be added for the process to work. The water CANNOT be cleaned after it is used for fracking. People will tell you it can be cleaned and we can drink, wash and cook with this water again. I used to believe this, but this is not true. If someone tells you this, ask them to show you a source. There is none.
2. How to balance the rights of property owners and local governments. The Ohio legislators gave the Ohio Dept of Natural Resources the "sole and exclusive right" to permit wells. Our city can deny you a permit for a fence or a garage, but has NO power over gas wells. By Ohio law, only the ODNR has that right. (Ohio Revised Code Section 1509.01, 1509.02.)
3. What impact the fracking industry has on our national security. According to a Forbes magazine article natural gas is being compressed and sold to Korea, China, France and other countries. We are depleting our water supply to extract our natural gas which is then sold to other countries. The profit from that sale goes to private oil and gas companies, not to our government.
The first time I heard about hydrofracking I didn't believe what the person was telling me and you probably won't believe me either.
Don't believe me; check out the facts for yourself and make up your own mind. Here is a link to the Ohio Environmental Council's webpage about fracking.
The next time there is a rally asking for a moratorium on fracking, I look forward to seeing you there.