Oil & Gas Accountability Project

EARTHWORKS' Oil & Gas Accountability Project works with tribal, urban and rural communities to protect their homes and the environment from the devastating impacts of oil and gas development. Learn more.

HOT ISSUES

Hydraulic fracturing (fracking)

• Potentially groundbreaking lawsuit: Pennsylvania landowner suits Marcellus Shale driller for contaminating his water. (AP, 11/9/09)
• Read EARTHWORKS joint press release regarding the letter of support signed by more than 160 community and national organizations urging passage of the Frac Act, which would safeguard our drinking water from the impacts of hydraulic fracturing.

• Read Abraham Lustgartens's latest piece about drilling issues, EPA: Chemicals Found in Wyo. Drinking Water Might Be From Fracking, in Pro Publica. Published 8/25/09.
• Read Abraham Lustgarten's article in Pro Publica about the misleading data industry is using to sway congress in their fight against fracking regulation. Published 7/8/09.
• Congress acts to try to end the Halliburton Loophole exemption to the Safe Drinking Water Act and to require public reporting of injected toxics.
• Listen to Face-off over 'Fracking' -- and hear our Gwen Lachelt on NPR's Morning Edition discussing the effort to end hydraulic fracturing's exemption from the Safe Drinking Water Act.
• Learn more about the history of the inadequate regulation of hydraulic fracturing, including information about the Halliburton loophole to the Safe Drinking Water Act and efforts to close it.
• Our main fracking page provides an issue overview, a discussion of water quality impacts, and links to more information including fracking myths and facts.

Marcellus (Appalachian) and Barnett (Texas) Shale

• OGAP releases a new report on drilling in the Marcellus Shale formation to better inform NY, PA, and OH residents about new development in their area.
• OGAP Senior Attorney, Bruce Baizel, testifies on risks to NYC watershed in front of Committee on Environmental Protection, Council of the City of NY
• We Are Doing It (Fort Worth Weekly, 3/25/09) highlights the efforts of local activists like "Texas Sharon" watchdogging the drilling industry in and around Fort Worth.

Better regulations

• Best Management Practices
• Congress acts to try to end the Halliburton Loophole exemption to the Safe Drinking Water Act and to require public reporting of injected toxics.
• Sublette County, WY, adopts new guidelines to address fracking hazards and inadequate information made available for medical treatment!
• New Mexico's Oil Conservation Commission signs final version of the oil and gas waste pit rule.
• New Mexico passes precedent setting landowner protection act.
• Colorado state and Santa Fe, New Mexico county pass the next generation of oil & gas regulations.
• Colorado Surface Owner Protection Actmore responsibly balances landowner rights vs. oil & gas drilling.
• OGAP releases report on industry's exemptions to major environmental laws in support of Congressional oversight hearings

Learn more about emerging health and environmental issues in oil and gas development.

Public Health and Toxics News

Salt build-up on pit.

OGAP asks for full disclosure

The Oil & Gas Accountability Project and its partners are working to secure the full public disclosure of chemicals that the oil and gas industry is releasing into our air, water and soil. In February, The Endocrine Disruption Exchange, Inc. released a new analysis of the chemicals used in the exploration and development of oil and gas in Montana. The Montana analysis builds upon what we already know about oil and gas chemicals and their associated health effects in states such as Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming and Washington. Learn more about chemicals used in oil and gas development.

Clearing the air in Colorado oil and gas communities

In December, 2006, the Colorado Air Quality Control Commission approved several new restrictions that limit oil and gas industry emissions. The changes were made in an effort to curb emissions of ozone-forming compounds, which are affecting air quality across the state and in the Denver region. Read more about the 2006 Air Quality Rule Changes.

Victory for New Mexicans with new rules on pits!

New Mexico's Oil Conservation Commission (OCC) signed the final version of the oil and gas waste pit rule on May 9, 2008. The new rules are some of the strongest in the country! The OCC crafted a rule fit for the 21st Century that locks in better oil and gas practices. The new rule takes effect over the next several weeks.

The OCC's pit rule won broad support from suburban landowners, ranchers, and residents across New Mexico who have suffered water and soil contamination from unlined oil and gas waste pits and buried waste. Between the mid-1980s and 2003, the New Mexico Environmental Bureau recorded nearly 7,000 cases of pits causing soil and water contamination. The New Mexico Oil Conservation Division released data in 2005 showing that close to 400 incidents of groundwater contamination had been documented from oil and gas pits.

Most recently, as part of the Pit Rule Task Force process, state sampling showed carcinogens in all pit samples and heavy metals in two-thirds of the pit samples.
Citizen groups, ranchers and landowners from throughout New Mexico are understandably quite concerned about water quality, exposure to unknown levels of
toxic chemicals, stock and wildlife deaths, and a broad range of other issues facing residents who live near oil and gas sites. View report on substances found in NM. pits.

The new pit rule bans unlined pits entirely and requires that all pits are permitted with the Oil Conservation Division (OCD). At long last, the public will finally have an inventory of pits in our state! The new rule also strengthens liner requirements and effectively requires the use of closed loop systems in close proximity to our water resources and homes. For more information - click here!

Protections for Wild Places

New Mexico's Valle Vidal. Photo credit: Jim O'Donnell

VICTORY FOR THE VALLE VIDAL: Landmark Valle Vidal Protection Act Becomes Law

President Bush signed the Valle Vidal Protection Act into law in mid-December. The new law will permanently protect the Valle Vidal, one of New Mexico's greatest natural treasures, by withdrawing the area from mineral leasing.

The Valle Vidal (Spanish for "Valley of Life") is a lush mountain basin in the heart of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in northern New Mexico. A majestic landscape of breathtaking vistas and abundant wildlife, it is often referred to as "New Mexico's Yellowstone."

Read the most recent news on the Valle Vidal.

Other wild places

OGAP and its partner organizations are working to protect other wild places such as Otero Mesa, the HDs Mountains and the Beartooth Front.

Find out about these wild places and about oil and gas development on public lands.

Publications

OGAP has produced Oil and Gas at Your Door? A landowner's guide to oil and gas development This 200-page book has been written to help demystify oil and gas development, and educate landowners on their legal rights and the laws that pertain to oil and gas. Download or order a guide today!
Read OGAP's report Our Drinking Water at Risk: What EPA and the Oil and Gas Industry Don't Want Us to Know About Hydraulic Fracturing. Download the Executive Summary or full 64-page report Find out more about the potential risks to drinking water posed by hydraulic fracturing.

Encouraging Industry to "Do it Right"

Often, communities or landowners are not opposed to drilling - they simply want to ensure that it is done in a way that minimizes impacts to the environment and their lives.

Learn about best practices, examples of progressive regulations, and about efforts to change government regulations so that when industry drills and produces oil and gas, they are Doing it Right.