Group seeks loophole closure
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WASHINGTON, D.C. – A nonpartisan environmental group asked the Environmental Protection Agency to close a loophole that exempts oil and gas extraction companies from reporting toxic chemical emissions to a public Toxics Release Inventory managed by the EPA.
According to a news release from the nonprofit Environmental Integrity Project, 395 facilities in six energy boom states – Colorado, Louisiana, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Wyoming – are emitting a combined 8.5 million tons of toxic chemicals each year, according to new data compiled by EIP.
The EIP sent a letter and report detailing why it believes the toxic emissions should be reported to the public toxics release inventory, but are not due to an arbitrary loophole that exempts the oil and gas extraction industry from such disclosure.
The new EIP data supports an October 2012 petition urging EPA action to close the TRI loophole.
The data on the impact of the reporting loophole in the six states was submitted to EPA Thursday by EIP and 13 other groups.
EIP said it found that 395 facilities in the oil and gas extraction industry each emitted more than 10,000 pounds of at least one toxic chemical, the annual threshold that would require reporting to the TRI in other industries.
Texas led the list of six states with 209 sites, followed by: Colorado (124); Louisiana (34); Wyoming (14); Pennsylvania (13); and North Dakota (1).
Nearly 200 of the sites surpassed this threshold two or more years in a row, according to EIP.
EIP said it surveyed the industry for 10 TRI-listed chemicals, including toxics such as formaldehyde, benzene and hexane. TRI reporting requirements apply to facilities that use or process more than 10,000 pounds of any listed chemical.
“We are in the middle of an oil and gas boom, but have far too little information about the environmental consequences,” said Eric Schaeffer, EIP’s executive director “Our research shows that many of these oil and gas plants emit tens of thousands of pounds of toxic pollutants every year, but that data was hard to get and incomplete.
“We need this industry to report that pollution to the Toxics Release Inventory where everyone can see it – just like chemical plants and other facilities have done for more than 20 years.”
“The Toxics Release Inventory would require fracking companies to give people information about threats to their families’ health,” said Sharon Wilson, Texas organizer, Earthworks Oil and Gas Accountability Project.
“Communities in the tri-state area of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia are literally being surrounded by dangerous emissions from major gas processing facilities that are not being properly controlled or reported,” said Robert Donnan, a citizen advocate from McMurray. “These communities have a right to know what they are being exposed to. Someone should be measuring the growing cumulative impacts.”
Among the 13 Pennsylvania facilities cited in the report was Laurel Mountain Midstream’s Davis compressor station in Greene County. EIP said it found in the 2011 state Department of Environmental Protection’s Natural Gas Emissions Inventory that the facility emitted 14,381 pounds of formaldehyde in one year.
For industries not exempted from reporting, the TRI provides free and publicly accessible information in a searchable online database. Facilities annually report the amount of each toxic chemical they use and how the chemicals were released or disposed of to the air, land, or water.
By contrast, the state emissions inventories from which EIP drew its data are reported on varying time cycles, exclude certain facilities, are not all available online without charge, and provide data only on air releases, not releases to water or land.