Texas OGAP

About the Texas Oil Gas Accountability Project

Texas OGAP is a campaign of EARTHWORKS. Comprised of local citizen activists, and staff and board members of EARTHWORKS, our goal is to address needed oil and gas policy reforms in Texas on the state and local level.

Texas has a great opportunity to learn from the mistakes of past oil and gas exploration and development. Unfortunately, without organized citizen action, the oil and gas industry is now running roughshod over the rights of landowners, and will threaten our communities, natural resources, wildlife and public health and safety. Texas OGAP was formed to ensure that drilling in Texas is done in a manner that protects these resources.

Texas OGAP operates through a steering committee of people directly affected by oil and gas development, attorneys, and elected officials. We anticipate broadening our efforts to include specific committees around water and air impacts, landowner rights, and other issues central to responsible natural gas extraction and transport.

Support Texas OGAP Convincing industry and government that Texas should learn from past mistakes requires staff, time and resources. And that costs money.

Background

In 2008, the Barnett Shale produced more than 12 billion dollars worth of oil and gas. The Barnett Shale is booming across 19 counties in north Texas. Landowners in West Texas, East Texas, the Pecos Region, and the Rio Grande Valley are seeing production increase just as rapidly. Landowners in these areas and across Texas are struggling to produce their minerals and protect landowner rights, agriculture, environmental integrity, and recreational opportunities, all of which are important to our way of life. While this production provides economic benefit to many landowners, county governments and the State of Texas, it also results in many detrimental impacts to the people, wildlife, lands and waters of our state.

JOIN Texas OGAP... And find out when and how you can make your voice heard with the officials that decide how responsibly the drilling industry will operate in Texas.

Current actions

Most recently, Texas OGAP coordinated with the Mayor of DISH to interpret and publicize the report demonstrating that gas processing facilities inside and adjacent to the town are polluting the air with toxics in excess of state limits.

Texas OGAP Member Groups

• FWCanDO
• BlueDaze
• PARCHED

For More Information

Impacted Communities

• Decatur, Texas: When Drilling Starts -- a family's story from the Barnett Shale gas play in north Texas
• DISH, Texas: One woman's struggle with toxics in the Barnett Shale

Studies and Reports

• DRILL RIGHT TEXAS: Best oil & gas development practices for Texas
• Read the DISH, Texas Municipal Ambient Air Quality Study. Read EARTHWORKS analysis of the study.
• Read EARTHWORKS' board member Wilma Subra's analysis of toxic chemicals being released from compressor stations and human health impacts experienced by DISH community members
• Community-based health survey of the Town of DISH
• View Environmental Defense Fund's report: Air Pollutants Linked with Barnett Shale Gas/Oil Production
• Read an assessment of the impacts of VOC emissions from oil and gas activity in the Barnett Shale area on ambient air levels of air pollutants in the Dallas-Fort Worth region

Video

• TX OGAP received these infrared videos of oil and gas emissions in the Barnett Shale area on November 3, 2009 from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality through a public information request.
   
  All images were uploaded exactly as we received them, without alteration of identifying information or image content in any way.
   
  Thanks to the Bluedaze drilling reform blog for categorizing the videos by county.

News Articles and Press Releases

• State to test health in DISH, Denton Record-Chronicle, 12/01/09
• Read Peggy Heinkel-Wolfe and Lowell Brown's award winning series of articles, Behind the Shale, from the Denton Record Chronicle.
• Read the Texas OGAP press release on the community health survey done by Wilma Subra in the wake of the Wolf Eagle study showing toxics in the air around DISH,TX.
• Read our joint press release about the air quality study done in DISH, Texas.
• Sacrificed to Shale, by Peter Gorman, in the Fort Worth Weekly. 10/14/2009
• Curbing Emissions by Sealing Gas Leaks, by Andrew C. Revkin and Clifford Krauss, in the New York Times. 10/14/2009.

Join

• Join Texas OGAP and find out when and how you can make your voice heard with the officials that decide how the drilling industry operates.
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