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writing for godot

Report on Climate Change Disruption

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Written by Tom Saunders   
Saturday, 23 January 2016 06:48
Report on Climate Change Disruption
Written for the Oklahoma Corporation Commission
By
Thomas M. Saunders, B.A. /B.S. Certified Linguist, Activist


{“I am an independent writer-researcher who has been working on Anthropogenic Climate Change and Fracking issues since 2012. I started by asking why people that lived near fracking operations were getting sick with the same medical problems as Agent Orange victims. The short answer is both sets of victims are being contaminated with the same types of Environmental Toxins.”} http://fracdallas.org/docs/edc.html

Introduction:

I was motivated to write this report at the urging of Senator James Lankford that I contact the Oklahoma Corporation Commission in regard to my concerns about the safety of gas fracking and its effects on the environment and human health. I have included his letter in the reference section of this document below.

Climate Change Disruption (ACD) Science is about more than just earthquakes, global warming, and greenhouse gases. ACDs are happening in man’s micro-biological, and macro world environments. These escalating disruptions in the micro and macro environments play a direct role with what happens in man’s social environment.

ACD events (micro, macro, or social) are on a natural 50 year timeline. What happens in the environments now takes 50 years to fully come to fruition, good or bad. Starting at year 2000, we are now 16 years into the first 50 year cycle. Extreme ACD events are being scientifically recorded and the predictions paint a dire forecast for the future.

Purpose of This Report:

The purpose of this document is to explain ACD events related to fracking as escalating emergencies. It is my intention to inform the Corporation Commission of a real impending danger concerning ACD events related to fracking that threaten the public health and welfare.

It is my hope that the Corporation Commission will address the dangers I explain in this report in accordance with the commission’s mission to preserve the public trust. My work is published with several community activist organizations and supported by the Libertarian Party of Oklahoma and Libertytalkradio.com.

The future of Anthropogenic Climate Disruptions (ACDs) are ever increasing number of severe inland floods, rising oceans, droughts, superstorms, ocean/lake acidification destruction, earthquakes, toxic biological, chemical, and radioactive contaminations, growing global greenhouse gas effects, huge property damage, social instability, famine, community displacement, species extinction, and critical shortages of life essential goods, and fewer organized essential life services.

Gas fracking contributes to all the ACD effects I have listed above. There are three dangerous effects gas fracking is contributing to that most directly threaten the general welfare. I am urging the Oklahoma Corporation Commission to address the issues of these effects in regard to fracking operations.

1. The Greenhouse Effect.
2. Effects of Acidification and Carbon Sink Capacities
3 The Effect of Critical Contamination of the Human Gene Pool.

1. The Greenhouse Effect:

The activity of the sun from sunspots and solar flares can cause measurable effects on the earth’s weather by affecting the radiation levels into earth’s magnetosphere. More solar activity can mean more heat and light intensity under the insulating thickening blanket of global gases. There is little doubt there is a systematic effect of solar activity in regard to ACD events. There is no evidence the solar activity intensity levels are directly responsible for specific ACD “non-linear (extreme) events, like earthquakes.

The greenhouse effect is the process by which solar radiation entering the planet's atmosphere warms the planet's surface to a temperature above what it would be in the absence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. In short, greenhouse gases trap heat.

The gas in the Earth’s atmosphere absorbs about 90 percent of this solar heat and traps it in the troposphere. Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases act like an insulator blanket, absorbing infrared radiation preventing it from escaping into outer space.

There is a point of critical contamination where carbon dioxide, becomes an Environmental Toxin that makes it impossible for the earth’s carbon sink cleansing process to function. The earth is dangerously close to a tipping point where the process of breaking down atmospheric gases (carbon sink capacity) may no longer happen to an extent needed for survival of certain species.

An excess of methane gas also affects the carbon sink capacity of earth, grasses, and plants. In terms of being greenhouse gas methane is far more destructive than carbon dioxide because it can trap lots more heat. Methane is produced primarily from industry and agriculture.

Cows are thought to produce 14% of the world’s methane emissions while according to a study of North Texas, oil and gas production accounted for 64 percent of total methane emissions in the Barnett Shale Region. http://www.onegreenplanet.org/animalsandnature/methane-vs-carbon-dioxide-a-greenhouse-gas-showdown/ http://www.texastribune.org/2015/07/07/new-study-adds-fuel-debate-fracking-and-climate/

2. Effects of Acidification and Carbon Sink Capacities:

Fracking operations produce gases like carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and particulates. These gases create acidification and effect carbon sink capacities.

Hydrospheric (lake/ocean) acidification changes the PH factors in water and is a direct cause of the oceans shrinking carbon sink capacity to break down excessive gases. The hydrosphere is overburdened with an excess of carbon dioxide and other accumulating greenhouse gasses to the point earth’s natural cleansing systems no longer work.

There is no evidence that the cause of the current escalation of hydrospheric and earthly acidification is the result of “other than man-made causes.” Acidification adversely affects the food chains of oceans and earth. This effect can cause extinction events.

3. The Effect of Critical Contamination of the Human Gene Pool:

We may already have passed the tipping point in the micro environment to avoid mass critical contamination of populations from Environmental Toxins.

Critical contamination from a biological, chemical, or radioactive environmental toxin is when exposure causes a definable medical condition. There is no rational argument that human critical contamination from Environmental Toxins, like EDCs, are caused by anything “other than from man-made sources.”

Teratogenic toxins like Agent Orange (Endocrine Disruption Chemicals/EDCs) create a victim likely to pass on mutation and defects to a fetus. These severe birth defects are transgenerational and are known to increase in severity from one generation to another. (See; Mekong Syndrome)

There are already "ground zero" areas where teratogenic EDC and critical radioactive contamination of certain populations has taken place. These places/populations include the Russian Polygon, the Mekong Delta, Fukushima, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki Japan, Denton Texas, and American Agent Orange victims from the Viet Nam War. Oklahoma.

The fracking process emits greenhouse gases and contaminates the air and water with Endocrine Disruption Chemicals. http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/34170-fracking-methane-and-paris also; http://fracdallas.org/docs/edc.html

Physicians for Social Responsibility have published a comprehensive work on the dangers of fracking. Their conclusion was that there is no way fracking is safe. http://www.psr.org/assets/pdfs/fracking-compendium.pdf

Dr. Susan Nagel of the University of Missouri and others determined that critical contamination from EDCs can happen as far away as ten miles from a fracking operation. http://press.endocrine.org/doi/10.1210/jc.2014-4324 http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/advpub/2015/8/ehp.1409535.acco.pdf

Physicians Science & Engineers has a fine database on healthy energy and ACD related articles. https://www.zotero.org/groups/pse_study_citation_database/items/

"The Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism" has published a report by a number of leading experts who say there is a 99% possibility that exposure to Endocrine Disruption Chemicals (EDCs) will cause a health problem, i.e. Critical Contamination. http://press.endocrine.org/doi/10.1210/jc.2014-4324 http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/advpub/2015/8/ehp.1409535.acco.pdf

Recent research by Linda Birnbaum of the National Institute of Health reveals that contaminations from large doses of EDC’s does not always cause the damage of low doses. Endocrine-disruption chemicals are non-monotonic meaning the response to EDCs does not necessarily intensify or diminish based upon the dose. Birnbaum's research showed that low doses of endocrine disruptors can cause critical contamination (the causing a medical effect), and can even cause more dramatic disruptions than higher doses. http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/1205179/

A medical study by Dr. Panettieri, R.A. quoted: "People who live near fracking sites suffer higher rates of heart conditions and a neurological illness says research." An American Pediatric study comes to the same conclusion, as have other medical studies. http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/people-who-live-near-fracking-sites-suffer-higher-rates-of-heart-conditions-and-neurological-illnesses-says-research-10391339.html

Oklahoma as a Critical Contamination Zone:

Oklahoma is 69,899 sq. miles, with a 3,900,000 population. For this model there are 40,000 extraction wells and 3200 disposal wells.

The approximations for this model are 60,000 lbs. of fracking compound per well, mixed with 5 million gallons of water per well. So, 2,400.000,000 (2.4 billion) lbs. of fracking compounds divided by 3,900,000 people = 615 lbs. per person. These chemical compounds are mixed with 5 or more million gallons per well which works out to be around 216 billion gallons of water. {A DOD report suggests we dropped 15 gallons of EDCs on Viet Nam.}

"The process involves pumping a high viscosity fluid additive into a rock formation through a man-made fracture, creating fluid filled cracks. Once these cracks are established, sand- like substance is injected to ensure these cracks do not close, allowing natural gas or oil to flow through the cracks and the well back to the surface." (Quote; Sen. James Inhofe)

In the ideal fracking business model approximately half of the fracking fluids are reputed to be recovered from the extraction wells and that pollution is presumed to be dumped into Oklahoma's disposal wells. Fracking compound mixtures are known to be made of up to 40% endocrine disrupters, like hydrochlorides and benzenes; BTEX. Often, the wastewater from fracking comes out radioactive and lots more deadly than when the fracking compounds went in. (see; The Endocrine Disruption Exchange)

Studies by Dr. Susan Nagel confirm that EDC (Endocrine Disruption Chemical) contamination can occur up to ten miles from a fracking site. The 43,200 wells x 10 mile contamination zone per well produces 432,000 square miles of contaminated area. This is roughly six times the size of the state.

EDCs are known to cause breast and prostate cancer, non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, thyroid diseases, and diabetes. EDCs are a direct cause of chromosomal damage, infertility, (Mekong Syndrome), asthma, obesity, strokes, heart disease, chloracne, peripheral neuropathy, autoimmune diseases, Alzheimer’s, Autism, and Parkinson's diseases. The teratogenic related birth defects from critical EDC or radiation contamination include missing organs, missing bones, extra limbs, enlarged hearts, and various forms of mental retardation. There are other less commonly known conditions from critical contamination from endocrine disruptors.

ACD Feedback Loops and Critical Tipping Points of ACD Events:

Man-made disasters in Climate Change Science have tipping points where no matter what you do it is no longer possible to return to the former state. There are signals like feedback loops, and critical slowing of recoveries that show the progress of ACD tipping points.

An example of a feedback loop is when a fire gets big enough to generate its own wind. When that effect happens it can create a lot more intense fire. Another example of a feedback loop is when a series of smaller earthquakes lead to larger ones.

The escalation of Autism is an indication of another feedback loop related to the human gene pool. Autism rates have increased at an alarming rate worldwide. Autism rates in Europe have remained virtually the same for the last decade, but in the U.S. they have risen from 1:10,000 in 1981, to 1:88 in 2012, to 1:68 in 2014. The tipping point in the gene pool will be when it is more likely to produce an autistic or deformed child than a normal one. http://truth-out.org/news/item/23267-autism-nation-americas-chemical-brain-drain

At sixteen years into a 50 year cycle from the year 2000, every ACD event I have mentioned in this report has feedback loops, and we are already reaching tipping points for some ACD events. The study of feedback loops and the understanding of tipping points is a fairly new field of study. More research is need in every aspect of ACD events. There can be little doubt that some tipping points will lead to extinctions.
http://ecologicalsociology.blogspot.com/2010/09/tipping-points-and-critical-slowing.html

ACD Events and Eventual Accountability:

The World Bank Group did a study on the eventual effects and accountability of Climate Change Disruptions. "Shock Waves: Managing the Impacts of Climate Change on Poverty" by the World Bank Group. This is a fine study but it failed to note the mass contamination of populations by EDCs. That was a serious oversight I hope to avoid with this document. The economic impact of mass EDC contamination with other ACD events will produce too big of an economic impact to ignore after the end of the first 50 year ACD cycle.
https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/22787/9781464806735.pdf

Fracking as I point out in my descriptions above endangers people.

“Earlier scientific predictions and anecdotal evidence are now bolstered by empirical data, confirming that the public health risks from unconventional gas and oil extraction are real, the range of adverse impacts significant, and the negative economic consequences considerable. Our examination of the peer-reviewed medical and public health literature uncovered no evidence that fracking can be practiced in a manner that does not threaten human health.” (Physicians for Social Responsibility) http://www.psr.org/assets/pdfs/fracking-compendium.pdf



Summary:

The Oklahoma Corporations Commission has a social, moral, and professional obligation to oversee the regulation of oil and gas activity in the state. The contents of this report clearly outline some of the destructive patterns of gas fracking and show the process is a medically and scientifically proven threat to human health and social welfare.


Reference: Letter from Senator James Lankford:

January 15, 2016

Dear Mr. Tom Saunders,

Thank you for taking time to share your thoughts and concerns about hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling. My home, like so many in Oklahoma has also experienced the distinct shaking of earthquakes in the past months. I appreciate hearing from you, as it keeps me informed of what matters to my fellow Oklahomans.

As you may know, the process of hydraulic fracturing (or "fracking") was initially developed in the 1940s to stimulate production from oil reservoirs with declining productivity. Most recently, technological advances in hydraulic fracturing have used the process to initiate oil and gas production in unconventional and low-permeable oil and gas formations. Its application in the production of natural gas from coal beds, tight gas sands, and unconventional shale formations has resulted in the marked expansion of estimated U.S. natural gas reserves in recent years.

Hydraulic fracturing involves injecting large volumes of water, sand, and specialized chemicals into production wells under enough pressure to fracture low-permeability geologic formations containing oil and/or natural gas. Fracturing fluid and water remaining in the fracture zone can inhibit oil and gas production and must be pumped back into the surface. The fracturing fluid – "flowback" – along with naturally occurring formation water pumped to the surface, together called "produced water," has typically been disposed through deep well injection. Less frequently, production water has been treated and discharged into surface waters. Energy companies are making efforts to treat and reuse flowback.

Oklahoma sits on a series of geologic fault lines, but recently seismic activity has dramatically increased. Nearly 700 earthquakes of magnitude 3.0 and larger occurred between 2010 and 2015 (more than 100 per year on average), compared with an average rate of 20 earthquakes per year from 1970-2000. Since January 1, 2016, Oklahoma has had several sizable earthquakes with the largest magnitude reaching just below the 5-point scale. These statistics raise important questions about whether the earthquakes are natural or man-made.

Many people directly link the high number of earthquakes with the increase in hydraulic fracturing and think the oil and gas industry is responsible. However, in their recent study, "Man-Made Earthquakes Updated", scientists at the U.S. Geological Service stated that while hydraulic fracturing works by making thousands of extremely small micro earthquakes that are generally too small to be felt, none have been large enough to cause structural damage. Further, the report states that the hydraulic fracturing process is very rarely, if at all, responsible for felt earthquakes.

Experts believe the practice of hydraulic fracturing itself is not related to seismic activity. However, there is concern that the process of disposing the waste water in underground wells may be. The Oklahoma Corporation Commission, the state entity charged with regulating oil and gas activity in Oklahoma, has been responsive to these concerns and has modified regulations for disposal wells, while they study the issue. The modifications include lessening the volume allowed to be injected into wells in areas with large amounts of seismic activity and ensuring the depth of injection does not reach unsafe zones. Regulation is best crafted closest to the issue with the active participation of local stakeholders. I encourage you to also communicate your concerns to the Corporation Commission.

We should continue to study the earthquake issues and stop or slow wastewater disposal until we have more information. We have kept in contact with the Corporation Commission and the insurance commission to track their research. It is my goal to help find the balance and promote safety for Oklahoma families and businesses.

Please feel free to continue to contact me via email at www.lankford.senate.gov for more information about my work in the United States Senate for all of us.

In God We Trust,


James Lankford
United States Senator
















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