Reading email while the tap water burns

UPDATE: For the best reporting to date on this case see: Better reporting on Range Resources water contamination case in Parker County, it is a long but essential read if you are interested in this case.

 

Ahm, so what? Dr. Armendaris sent out a courtesy email to a few people who work directly with gas patch victims notifying us that FINALLY, after four months, they were taking action to protect the people in Parker County who have explosive levels of methane and other drilling related hydrocarbons in their water.

It’s too bad the reporter took the easy way out and, without investigation, wrote a story full of holes and from the industry’s point of view. It’s not the first time he has done that. Fool me once…

I sympathize with reporters who are overworked and underpaid. When he talked to me mid-morning, he said his deadline was noon. But still, it’s common knowledge that the Texas Railroad Commission is so utterly worthless even the Sunset Advisory Board recommended they be abolished? It’s also common knowledge the agency is plagued with conflict of interest issues.

Not commonly known, although I don’t know why because I figured it out: Texas has no regulation specific to hydraulic fracturing, so to claim or even hint the Feds are interfering with state regulation is, ________ Pick One: a) dim, b) lazy.

To this reporter, the big story is not families with flammable water (VIDEO: Hydraulic Fracturing turns gardenhose to flamethrower) or a regulatory agency plagued with conflict of interest issues or the thousands of cases of contaminated water shortly after fracking. The big story is my email. Nice reporting.

More glaring evidence of a reporter with a point of few can be seen in his suggestion that the Texas Railroad Commission did not know the order was coming.

A story about EPA’s action, quoting Armendariz, had appeared on the website of WFAA-TV, Channel 8, about a minute before an aide notified a top state regulator on Armendariz’s behalf, the records show. That regulator, then-Texas Railroad Commission Chairman Victor Carrillo, replied that his agency was still investigating and called the federal action “premature.”

If you simply read the email chain, it clearly shows that the “top state regulator” was well aware the order was coming.

Thanks for the notice but as I have said repeatedly — it is a premature action while we continue to investigate.
Victor Carrillo

It’s tough to pull off victimization when there is so much evidence to counter it.

We are facing the biggest environmental crisis of this decade and, after a decade of decay under George Bush, the EPA is finally trying serve the public and be transparent by communicating with all parties. The Big Gas Mafia and its lap dogs scurry around in shadows and secrecy because they cannot survive a bright light. This is a desperate attempt to avoid regulation by an industry in its death throes. It is the same thing as their pathetic letter to the Academy of Arts about the Oscar nomination of GASLAND.

Hey, the really cool thing is my email reply is in the NY Times, and the other really cool thing is I got hate mail from some moron who calls himself “red rooster.”

NOTE: I totally ripped off the title from the god of editorials, Mike Trimble’s, opinion piece: Fiddling while the tap water burns.

Let us see if we have this right: The tap water is bubbling in Parker County, carbonated with enough natural gas to make it as flammable as a French Quarter cocktail and as explosive as a hand grenade, and the Texas Railroad Commission — consulting its Advent calendar, no doubt — has scheduled a hearing on the matter for Jan. 10.

UPDATE: Because some of you didn’t find my (where it says “my email reply is in the NY Times) link to the Greenwire article in the NY Times, CLICK HERE.