Thanks to the Community Foundation for the Alleghenies for funding a Community Science project for the Appalachian Petrochemical Protection, FreshWater Accountability Project made great progress over the last year to purchase and install low-cost air monitoring equipment. With the development of low-cost air monitors to capture the actual emissions of Total Volatile Organic Compounds (TVOCs) from Air Viz and the retro-fitted particulate air sensors from Purple Air, impacted community members who live in the Ohio Valley in proximity to the proposed PTT Global ethane cracker plant at Dilles Bottom, Ohio, and the Energy Storage Ventures’ proposed Mountaineer Ethane Storage caverns near Clarington, Ohio have been equipped and educated to measure TVOCs inside and outside their homes at locations above and below the proposed locations. In addition to the 20 air monitors already installed, we are waiting on delivery of 10 more Air Viz and will likely need another 10 more when they become available through Create Lab. With the funding received, local residents are able to collect real data to show that the air inside and outside their homes has industrial toxins which can lead to health issues. This is a critical step in holding the industry accountable for its harms because in most cases, the regulatory agencies do not respond to citizen complaints with immediate air monitoring to detect harmful pollutants. Prior to the ability for residents to access air quality monitoring themselves, they were only able to document odor logs, but now we have data and plan to develop a crowd-sourced local reporting project through a web portal at www.concernedohioriverresidents.org
By working with local residents in conjunction with volunteer scientists with air monitoring expertise through our project with the American Geophysical Union’s Thriving Earth Exchange Project, we can show air pollution trends and document spikes of harmful TVOC’s and particulate matter that have escaped notice from the regulatory agencies (more information here: https://thrivingearthexchange.org/projects/location/usa/ohio/belmont-county/. Now residents are more likely to have their concerns addressed because the data shows harmful elevations of toxic air pollutants surrounding their homes and migrating inside.
Funding was used to purchase testing equipment, train volunteers, install the monitoring equipment, and review results through a reporting website for baseline testing of air and water in the region of the planned petrochemical plant by PTT Global. As news of our ability to provide testing equipment to impacted community members spreads, interest and demand for our support have been requested by people who are directly impacted by fracking and fracking-related infrastructure in the region. As a part of the baseline reporting that this project will provide, it has also expanded to include the capture of pollutants currently emitted by existing fracking infrastructure such as pipelines and compressor stations. As a result, we have identified not only airborne pollutants, but are finding evidence of subsurface travel of VOCs into people’s homes. Additional equipment was purchased for methane monitoring, and with the remaining funds, we plan to purchase low-cost SUMA canisters recently made available to verify the monitor results and to make formal requests for regulatory agency assistance to stop the harmful spread of toxic pollution above and below ground.
Funding was used to purchase testing equipment, train volunteers, install the monitoring equipment, and review results through a reporting website for baseline testing of air and water in the region of the planned petrochemical plant by PTT Global. As news of our ability to provide testing equipment to impacted community members spreads, interest and demand for our support have been requested by people who are directly impacted by fracking and fracking-related infrastructure in the region. As a part of the baseline reporting that this project will provide, it has also expanded to include the capture of pollutants currently emitted by existing fracking infrastructure such as pipelines and compressor stations. As a result, we have identified not only airborne pollutants, but are finding evidence of subsurface travel of VOCs into people’s homes. Additional equipment was purchased for methane monitoring, and with the remaining funds, we plan to purchase low-cost SUMA canisters recently made available to verify the monitor results and to make formal requests for regulatory agency assistance to stop the harmful spread of toxic pollution above and below ground.
We are still waiting for the analysis of results from water samples collected from the Ohio River River and have plans to do additional surface water sampling above and below fracking sites and the toxic, radioactive frack waste processing and disposal sites. Additional sampling is planned once COVID restrictions are eased for travel and with warm weather approaching. Water sampling and analysis for provided at no charge as an add-on to another Thriving Earth Exchange project in the Youngstown area in which we are involved (https://thrivingearthexchange.org/project/youngstown-oh/). It is important to provide additional testing of the Ohio River in the Belmont County area, especially because of the planned barging of fracking waste into a barge loading/unloading facility in Bellaire (see article here: https://comtechindustriesinc.com/news/produced-water-barging-provides-a-cost-saving-disposal-solution-for-operators-in-appalachia/. We are not planning to set up a “nurdle patrol” at this time because it appears the final investment decision for the PTT Global cracker plant has been delayed once again, if not indefinitely postponed (https://www.concernedohioriverresidents.org/post/belmont-county-cracker-plant-indefinitely-delayed-again-casting-doubt-on-project-s-viability). In the meantime, all air and water sampling data will continue to be collected for baseline results if the cracker plant does get built to enable residents living near the plant to hold PTT Global for any environmental degradation and public health harms it may cause.
The project continues because we are finding increasing evidence of air pollution from existing fracking-related infrastructure in the Valley. Our efforts will continue to use the monitoring equipment and result we have obtained so far to be able to identify the source of contaminants. At the present time, we are assembling a formal complaint to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency to make a formal request for an investigation. Once the industry learns that we are able to use accurate air monitors and citizen scientists to assign accountability for pollutants, this will certainly chill the further proliferation of the industry in the valley. Our collaboration with the Thriving Earth Exchange also offers pro bono legal assistance if needed once pollution events can be assigned to a source. In the past, the industry has been allowed to pollute with impunity because the regulatory agencies have not provided monitoring equipment and oversight to assign accountability to the polluters for their harms. As a result of this project, we will be able to do so, and in turn, provide evidence to the OEPA that will compel them to take a closer look at existing pollution and investigate the source themselves.
Since we have already discovered harmful spikes of hazardous pollutants in the Valley, we intend to expand this program. We have already alerted the public to the fracking-related pollution problem in the Valley and shared the opportunities for community science in our webinar, “Making the Invisible Visible,”(see our webinar presentation here: https://www.concernedohioriverresidents.org/post/webinar-illustrates-dangers-of-fracking-related-air-pollution. Through continued sharing of data with the Ohio EPA and the documentation accumulated from impacted residents, we are hopeful the Ohio EPA will join us to investigate the pollutants to assign accountability to those who are causing health harms in the region.
Once the low-cost SUMA canisters are installed to verify the high spikes of toxic chemicals in homes, we hope to compel the OEPA to do a formal study themselves of the impacted region. If there is underground migration of toxic chemicals getting into people’s homes, this will also help us to justify to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources that the ground is being pressurized with toxic chemicals and gases migrating from leaks underground. We will also share our results with PTT Global to let them know that we are equipped to capture and log emission exceedances that the plant would emit if built. We continue our community awareness and education program and will be writing a paper about our results. As more people become aware of the tools available to them to hold polluters accountable for the health harms they are experiencing, we believe this will chill the industry’s expansion and establish protocols that can be implemented throughout the region heavily impacted by fracking and frack waste facilities. This should also let PTT Global know that the failing fracking industry is not a good bet upon which to base their decision to invest approximately $10 billion to build an ethane cracker plant, a heavy VOC emitter, especially in the Valley prone to air inversions and with citizens equipped to assign accountability to the source.