Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the environmental and public health concerns of natural gas drilling and hydrofracturing wastewater problems in New York. I commend your efforts because I believe this issue warrants New York’s utmost concern.
For decades, New York has failed to identify, investigate and clean up gas drilling wastewater hazards reported at hundreds of sites. Toxics Targeting has compiled detailed data from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation’s (DEC) hazardous substances spills database regarding gas drilling wastewater releases that have reportedly impacted homes, waterways, drinking water wells and natural resources.
New York’s existing gas drilling wastewater problems could be vastly exacerbated if Marcellus Shale horizontal hydrofracturing is permitted to proceed without adequate safeguards. That is why I urge you to require that the problems I will document today to be fully resolved before New York’s de facto horizontal hydrofracturing moratorium is lifted by the adoption of a Final Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (SGEIS).
