Buckeye Forest Council & 50 Environmental, Health & Safety Groups call for Shale Drilling Moratorium

Click here for the latest updates and press coverage on this issue.  

Brine spraying communities and corp. list

fracking_agriculture_factsheet_

jobs_fact_sheet

marcellus_accountability_project-1

Ohio regulation and rule deficiencies 

cunningham lease

fracking power point

emans-_unusual_oil_and_gas_lease_provisions

harvard-ohio-leasing-guide

COLUMBUS, OH – A consortium of dozens of environmental and health and safety groups, representing tens of thousands of members throughout Ohio, today presented a letter to each member of the Ohio General Assembly asking that body to immediately issue a moratorium ordering the Ohio Department of Natural resources (ODNR) to withhold approval of well permits involving high volume, horizontal hydraulic fracturing, exploration, or extraction until such time as these drilling practices are demonstrated to be safe for the environment and human health and are properly and effectively regulated.

Buckeye Forest Council and 23 Groups Oppose Drilling in State Parks and Nature Preserves

Buckeye Forest Council, and our partners send the Ohio General Assembly in opposition to legislation introduced to allow drilling for oil and gas on state lands. We believe that our state parks, state forests, state nature preserves, Lake Erie, and other state properties should be off limits to oil and gas extraction. Our state parks attract 50 million visitors each year, and the State of Ohio has a solemn duty to honor its promise to perpetually care for—and not exploit—its public lands, to forever protect the last remaining vestiges of our natural heritage for generations to come. 

BLM Planning To Lease Wayne National Forest For Oil And Gas Drilling

ATHENS, OHIO – The Bureau of Land Management plans to lease 3,302 acres of the Wayne National Forest for oil and gas development.  The BLM will be auctioning off five parcels of the Wayne on December 7, 2011 at their offices in Springfield, Virginia.  For those wishing to protest the sales, formal protest letters must be faxed to the BLM office at (703) 440-1551. by close of business on Friday, October 7.

BLM documents show that three of the five parcels, totaling 2623 acres, are in Athens County along the Hocking River and closeby tributaries. Another, in Perry County, is over 528 acres and one in Gallia County about 151 acres.  The Athens County and Perry County parcels sit atop the Utica shale, which the oil and gas industry is currently developing using high-volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”

Government officials, local residents and community organizations are concerned that fracking on the Wayne along the Hocking River could result in significant environmental damage to the local water supplies as well as the forest itself.  “The aquifer that feeds Athens, the Burr Oak Water District, and the Le-Ax Water District appears to underlie several of the parcels,” said Heather Cantino, Athens City resident and Board Chair of the Buckeye Forest Council.  “Local officials and residents are concerned that water withdrawals of millions of gallons of water per well from the Hocking and our aquifer and pollution from spills, leaks, and chemical injections will threaten our drinking water. Our cities do not have the resources to monitor or remediate radioactive and toxic pollution,” Cantino added.