Gas Drilling and the American Way

            Last week, the City Council of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania voted 9-0 to ban gas drilling within its limits, as reported by AP and the New York Times. This story is important for several reasons, some more immediate than others. The most immediate reason the story is important is that gas drillers may have a restricted range of operation if other cities and towns follow the lead of Pittsburgh. The other immediate reason is that concerns over the hazards of the hydro-fracturing process, in which millions of gallons of water mixed with chemicals and sand are injected deep underground to fracture the shale that holds the natural gas, are sufficiently well-known so that they weigh heavily in the balance of decision against the economic incentives of gas drilling, including royalties for land owners and boosted employment in a predominantly rural area. A less apparent reason the story is important is that it tells us that American values of self-determination and citizen involvement are alive and well, whether one agrees with the Council’s action or not. The Council vote was not spontaneous: it was preceded by proposed legislation, which someone wrote, and preceded by public speech, which prompted the legislation. So in Pittsburgh we see that the American way can and does work – the people who live there spoke up, made a decision about their lives and asked their public servants to act on it. The public servants did so, and there you have it – the American way, alive and well.  

BP and the American Way -- A Perspective

As those of you read the HD5 Newsletter may know, it has been following the BP spill disaster since it bolted to front-and-center in April and has been reporting on the gas development of the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania. Both of these stories engaged the classic contest between business, government and the people on which they both depend. In reporting on both, the HD5 Newsletter emphasized that both business and government exist for the people who are their customers and for the people they serve as citizens. The response of BP and the federal government may have disappointed many of us, for many reasons, but their response recognized they were answerable to the people, as customers and as citizens.

The development of the Marcellus Shale for natural gas is another example of how business and government recognize they are answerable to the people. In New York, the state government listened to the concerns of a group of people who sought to protect vital water resources and put a moratorium on gas drilling, in Pennsylvania, drilling continues apace, but new rules that are responsive to the noted hazards of the gas drilling are coming into place and enforcement has become more vigorous. We need to protect and strengthen this value – that institutions exist for us as customers and citizens – in our society.

To recognize the value of what we, as Americans, have, we need only look at societies where neither business nor government has any responsibility to the people. In Oil on Water by Helon Habila, just published in England and reviewed by the Manchester Guardian, we are introduced to the Niger Delta, formerly a natural-history wonderland, now an oil-field wasteland. All of the benefits of oil-drilling go to the businesses that extract the oil, without any safety or environmental regulations, and the government, that stands by as it takes its cut of the spoils, just for guarding the oil rigs from the people who live there. Meanwhile, the people that live in the delta see their tiny subsistence farms destroyed, their rivers and wells poisoned, and their livestock die. And they themselves are poisoned, and die. Nothing has been done for 60 years to improve their lot or the drilling practices of the oil companies. Why is this allowed? The answer is simple: neither business nor government is responsible to the people, they are just in the way.

The American way is far from perfect, ask anyone after a miserable day at work – but, at its core, it demands that business and government serve the people. Whether they come up to the mark is our responsibility. But we have the responsibility to exercise, and for that we must be thankful.

WELCOME

  

WELCOME

Welcome to the ThriftyPropanePeople blog! This blog will provide ongoing coverage of energy and energy politics affecting people who use energy in their daily lives – particularly propane energy. Those of you who use propane are using an energy source that grows in importance every day, with its sister fuel, natural gas. Propane should be pure, consistent, clean-burning, long-lasting and healthy, and HD5 propane, derived from natural gas processing, is all of those things. By contrast, “commercial grade” propane, the “odds and ends” of the oil refining process, is none of those things: but it is very profitable. Politics, in industry, at the statehouses and in Washington has made the propane picture far more tangled than it needs to be. This blog will take that tangle on – with clear thinking, clear facts and a clear purpose – to give you the best coverage of one of America’s most promising energy sources, pure HD5 propane.