Tioga Landowner Napalm Clusterfrack

Update here - the Tioga Napalm Clusterfrack was shut down as another fracking scam.

http://www.nofrackingway.us/2012/04/05/tioga-commie-clusterfrack-accounting/

Tioga County Landowners have issued a “world wide” press release announcing a deal on their mineral rights : At exactly the lowest price for natural gas since the turn of the century.

Terms are not a conventional royalty, but some communal sharing arrangement that sounds a whole lot like . . . communism. The landowners, the press release crows, will get “the majority of the profits earned by the communal sharing company”. The economics of which can be summarized with the following equation:

$ 0 x 0 = $ 0

Unless you are an attorney that represents one of these “landowner” groups. . . in which case it’s candy from babies. Consequently, it was the landowners attorney that are touting the deal to the press, and hyping Gasfrac . . . when nobody else is using them:

http://tomwilber.blogspot.com/2012/03/breaking-news-propane-fracking-deal.html

This is what’s known in the industry as a “clusterfrack” - whereby many naive landowners are fracked at the same time. It is believed that the Tioga County Landowners deal is the largest clusterfrack in history. If you know any landowners that want :

1. A big piece of nothing

2. Using a propane frack method that would not be economical even at $5mcf . .

3. That can blow sky-high at any time before, during or after the frack

http://www.texassharon.com/2011/11/23/propane-not-a-good-substitute-for-water-in-fracking/

4. At the worst gas price since the turn of the century

5. Get ripped off by some lawyers and landmen . . again . . .

(fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me) Then by all means have them join the Tioga County Landowners Commie Clustefrack. Call today. Operators are standing by. “Se Habla Amish”. Gelled propane (ie. napalm) fracks - might be less environmentally hazardous than dirty water - if you can stand the occasional conflagration -

http://www.nofrackingway.us/2012/04/02/tioga-landowners-exploding-propane-clusterfracks/

http://marcelluseffect.blogspot.com/2012/03/could-gas-fracking-fuel-ny-gas-boom.html

What propane does not address is the release of methane from well bores into groundwater -

http://www.scribd.com/doc/65577477/How-Gas-Wells-Leak

So if big chunks of Tioga County do not blow up during the clusterfrack, they will be flammable after the well bores start to release methane into groundwater. There are a whole bunch of unknowns regarding propane fracks:

* still needs large quantities of additional, but different chemicals to add to the LPG

* big compressors on each site to recondense returned propane for reuse, and additional processing on each site for re-use = heavy industrial hazardous operation

* frack process has to be nearly “robotic” because of risks to personnel at the well head

* two LPG frack explosions/fires in past year, with hospitalizations;

http://www2.canada.com/calgaryherald/news/calgarybusiness/story.html?id=4543819c-2303-4496-a365-0766c8e64144

http://m.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/husky-well-fire-injures-several-alberta-workers/article1932947/?service=mobile

* many truckloads of LPG needed for each frack job- these trucks are transporting hazardous material, not water

* Schlumberger, Hallliburton, et al. will not like encroachment on their turf..they have billions invested in equipment and personnel training for water based fracing, but they currently say they are “interested” in this new line of research . . . enough to block it until they own it . . .

* the ONLY substantive information about the process comes from the company - in effect advertising claims. There has been no independent empirical analysis of the complete life cycle of LPG frack

* pumps toxic substances into the formation, with the same risks

1) communication back to surface via faults and orphan wells

2) communication/migration of methane, gaseous propane and other pollutants via casing sealing failures and leaks (cf the Pavilion/EPA study (11-10-11 released) and the “Duke” methane migration study), and

3) surface spills of frack related materials that comes back up

4) added danger of propane near the well pad in large amounts and causing an explosion hazard, since propane is heavier than air, it will sink and channel down slope - don’t light your grill.

The deal reads as a way around the proposed regs. for high volume horizontals SGEIS

Via the 1992 GEIS, which was a bad joke - in 1992 -

http://www.scribd.com/doc/76085928/Worst-Practices-at-the-DEC

DEC regs. would allow a propane frack 100′ from your door or 150′ from a school:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/72545747/Worst-Fracking-Regs

DEC spokesperson Emily DeSantis quoted as saying this might need”additional SEQRA review and EIS if warranted” - which assumes it is not a complete hoax. Meaning one of the DEC’s dozen oil and gas inspectors might have to figure this propane clusterfrack out under the GEIS:

• Population Tioga County NY = 51,049
• Total Land Area = 523 sq mi => 334,720 acres
• 135,000 acres under lease = 40% land area -
• land ostensibly owned by 200 + “families”. . .
• However lots of leased land is owned by LLCs (corporations) etc.not families.
• So if each owner is 2 people who live in the county . . .200 x 2 = 400 people => 0.7% of the total population control 40% of the land to be fracked beyond recognition - as the PSU study indicates

My guess - they might do a test frack with propane - to test the Marcellus in Tioga County. Which they could do by extrapolating across the border from Pa. And use that test to try to get a real deal - when gas comes back to $5 mcf - some time in the next decade.

Beyond that, the great Tioga Landowners Napalm Clusterfrack deal is just fracking BS. So, under the heading, “Fractured Fairy Tale”- here’s a copy of their memo, hot off the Net: