After the U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced the purchase of more than 2,600 acres of land for the purpose of oil and natural gas drilling in Athens County, area public officials and residents have raised vocal concerns.
In order to ensure that federal officials hear their opposition, though, all public protest must be filed with the Bureau of Land Management, Eastern State Office by Friday.
The auction, which will be held in Springfield, Va., this December, will feature leases in three states. More than 2,623 of those acres are in Athens County, according to a news release from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.
The proposed leases are all part of Wayne National Forest, including land adjunct to the Hocking River upstream from Athens. The HockHocking Adena Bikeway will run next to the land, as well.
“It could ruin our county — people won’t be able to sell their land or get mortgages, no one who can leave will choose to stay, tourists won’t want to come to a stinky industrial zone,” said Heather Cantino, chair of the Buckeye Forest Council. “The county will be a toxic dump.”
In recent years, hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” has become a popular way to extract natural gas thousands of feet below the surface. However, fracking has also been linked to environmental and health problems, including toxic chemicals leaking into water supplies and the extinction of local species.
“Many hundreds of chemicals injected into wells for horizontal fracturing are highly toxic,” Cantino said. “Tens of thousands of gallons of chemicals are used in each well and water withdrawals from the aquifer or (the Hocking river) would also threaten our drinking water supply.”
Fracking waste is exempted from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Clean Water Act, Cantino said. Companies can therefore inject tens of thousands of chemicals into the Earth with no regulation from the National Environmental Protection Act.
“We have a lot of control over what they (the oil and gas companies) do on the surface,” said Gary Willison, Watershed Program Manager on the Wayne National Forest. “We’re concerned over the aquifers but we have no ability to manage what goes on below the surface.”
Willison went on to say that any damage to the water table would fall under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Land Management or the state. There are substantial regulations in place to insure that environmental impact on the surface will be minimal, he added.
There are currently over 1,000 oil and natural gas wells across 1,400 acres in the Wayne National Forest, however they were all drilled vertically and do not go deeper than a couple thousand feet – horizontal hydraulic fracturing can reach depths of 8,000 feet.
“We inspect wells on an annual basis … by and large, we haven’t had any major problems,” Willison said.
At last night’s City Council meeting, councilmembers discussed sending a letter to Dr. John Lyon, state director of the Bureau of Land Management’s Eastern States Office, urging him to withdraw the leases in Athens County in order to properly assess the land.
“It’s our land and they should follow the rules. Plain and simple,” said Councilwoman Nancy Bain.
—Kelly Gifford contributed to this article
dd195710@ohiou.edu
