Nasty 'fracking' feuds divide towns

[marmar]

(AP) - Ron Hilliard came back from church one Sunday to find hundreds of plastic $5, $10, $20 and $100 bills hanging on his fence in Flower Mound, Texas, another message from townsfolk angry at him for signing a lucrative natural gas drilling lease for his suburban Dallas property.

In Damascus, Pa., about 1,500 miles away, drilling advocate Marian Schweighofer awoke one morning to the word "LORAX" — from the Dr. Seuss book about environmental destruction — spray-painted on the road near her family's 712-acre farm.

Hilliard and Schweighofer have never met, yet both are living with the nastiness and rancor erupting in communities nationwide over the volatile issue of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

This technique — used with horizontal drilling — allows rich stores of gas to be extracted from once out-of-reach, dense shale formations more than a mile underground. Intense drilling activity is under way in the Barnett Shale of Texas, the Marcellus Shale of Pennsylvania, and other producing shale regions around the country. As tens of thousands of Americans become energy magnates in their own backyards, tens of thousands more worry about environmental dangers. The industry insists the process is safe, for people and the environment. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110412/ap_on_re_us/us_gas_drilling_torn_towns

[SpiralHawk]

1. "Shock & fracking Awe, baby. Sneer." - RepubliCorp (R)

"Divide & conquer." - RepubliCorp (R)

[nc4bo]

2. Just saw this posted by a FB friend.....Oil Talking Points.

Supposedly from a dropped binder of a gas company landman, in someone's driveway.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B8C7l9u-tCRLYzY1M2M5ZGEtMmNmNy00MGU5LWI0MjAtYjBjODg1NDNlMmM1&hl=en


Not going to name names but if you search via FB you will find.

[WatsonT]

3. Look I enjoy a spirited battlestar galactica debate as much as the next person

but keep it civil.

/kidding, this is a serious issue and I can see why both sides would be pissed in this.

[Cresent City Kid]

4. This is happening 100 miles from my house and I have well water

The Texas legislature is considering a bill to have frackers disclose the ingredients of fracking fluid, but it's from a GOP legislator and I smell a rat. This was according to a local news report, WOAI tv about 3 weeks ago. I'll have to look into this and report back.

[patrice]

5. awesome! I'll be watching for you! & Thanks!

I mean NOT awesome that that's happening, but awesome that you'd study a real situation and teach the rest of us about it.

:hi:

[otohara]

6. I Attended EPA Public Hearing on Fracking....

with in minutes, about 25 liberal types, got up and left, because it was packed with pro-fracking residents and workers from the area of the state where the fracking fields are.

It was clear and somewhat shocking to us liberals how ugly this fight was and how prepared the oil/gas/employees/land owners were and how unprepared we were. Very divisive atmosphere.

[patrice]

7. Sounds like our coal-plant hearings around here. You have people whose JOBS are to

put it over on the rest of us, LOTS of these people who spend all day EVERY day gettin' it done.

Then, you have the rest of us who have to take time away from our own paychecks to be at these meeting which are almost always during the middle of a work day, people who research and write about and organize with others on their limited "free" time. Yes, there are paid professionals on our issues, but there are FEW of them and that still doesn't address the handicaps upon the voters to stay informed and active.