Shale gas extraction causes environmental risks
On 16 January 2012, the press-conference entitled “Shale gas extraction: violation of the community’s rights and environmental risks” was given by Iryna Sekh, head of the Commission of Environment, Natural Resources and Recreation of Lviv Regional Council, Dmytro Skrylnikov, head of NGO “Bureau of Environmental Investigations” and Yelyzaveta Alekseyeva, head of legal department of International public interest environmental law organization “Environment-People-Law”.
During the year of 2011, Lviv regional Council refused to approve inclusion of Oles’ko deposit into the List of minerals containing areas that can be assigned according to product sharing agreements. In order to eliminate from this process local self-governance bodies, in particular regional councils of western regions of Ukraine, in November 2011 the Parliament of Ukraine amended the Law of Ukraine “On Product Sharing Agreement” and canceled the above mentioned List, thus eliminating local communities from the process of decision-making on approval of minerals development according to product sharing agreements. This enabled the authorities to decide the fate of these territories and their allocation for shale gas development at their own discretion. On 30 November 2012, at the request of the Ministry of Environment and Natural resources of Ukraine the Cabinet of Ministers adopted the Resolution # 1297 that approved the procedure of holding the tender for concluding the agreement on sharing hydrocarbons that will be extracted within Oles’ko area. According to the Resolution, total area to be assigned to the investor is 6,324 sq km (for comparison: the total area of Lviv region is 21,833 sq km). According to the head of State service of geology and minerals Eduard Stavytskyi, the State service of geology and minerals plans to hold the tender on Oles’ko gas-bearing area at the end of March. The product sharing agreement will be concluded with the winner of the tender. Currently tender conditions are being developed. On 25 January 2012, the State service of geology and minerals plans to announce the tender on exploration of Oles’ko area. The tender will be held approximately on 25 March (60 days after the announcement). Such companies as ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, Eni, TNK-BP and Ukrainian “Ukrnafta” and “State fuel and energy complex Naftogas” are expected to participate in the tender. Iryna Sekh stated: “Our fears came true – the State service of geology and minerals started distributing the right to shale gas development in Lviv region without any consultations with the community. In November the legislation was amended to eliminate authority of local self-governance bodies to approve allocation of mineral areas (deposits) on the conditions stipulated by the product sharing agreement. In particular, p.2 in Art 9-1 envisaging obligatory approval by local self-governance bodies of the List of areas (deposits of minerals) to be assigned for use on the basis of product sharing agreement, was eliminated from the Code on minerals. The same amendments cutting authority of local self-governance bodies have been introduced into the Law “On product sharing agreement”. In fact having amended the legislation in this way, the authorities now can solve their private issues without asking about public opinion and ignoring the issues of environmental safety. Lviv region has already had bad experience when as a result of functioning of National Joint-Stock Company “Naftogas of Ukraine” roads were ruined, water wells in villages were contaminated with oil and gas, development was done with violations of safety norms. Now let’s imagine that investors having certain agreements with the State service of geology and minerals come to Lviv region. What can we expect form such “well-wishers”? Having injected thousands of tons of chemicals underground, they will make this territory a delayed-action bomb because the processes caused by vertical drilling and hydro fracturing are not sufficiently studied and it is unclear whether they can be controlled.”According to Yelyzaveta Alekseyeva, shale gas development caused serious debate in Europe and the USA, especially on its environmental consequences. The conclusions developed by experts for the European Parliament state that “unavoidable impact of shale gas extraction is a high land occupation due to drilling pads, parking and maneuvering areas for trucks, equipment, gas processing and transport facilities as well as access roads. Major possible impacts are air emissions of pollutants, groundwater contamination due to uncontrolled gas or fluid flows due to blowouts or spills, leaking fracturing fluid, and uncontrolled waste water discharge. Fracturing fluids contain hazardous substances, and flow-back in addition contains heavy metals and radioactive materials from the deposit. Experience from the USA shows that many accidents happen, which can be harmful to the environment and to human health. The recorded violations of legal requirements amount to about 1-2 percent of all drilling permits. Many of these accidents are due to improper handling or leaking equipment. Furthermore, groundwater contamination by methane, in extreme cases leading to explosion of residential buildings, and potassium chloride leading to salinization of drinking water is reported in the vicinity of gas wells. The impacts add up as shale formations are developed with a high well density of up to six well pads per km. According to Dmytro Skrylnikov, experts have concluded that on the level of legislation Europe is not ready to extract shale gas, numerous legislative gaps increase risks of shale gas extraction. “A question to be answered is whether the injection of toxic chemicals in the underground should be allowed, or whether it should be banned as such a practice would restrict or exclude any later use of later use of the contaminated layer (e. g. for geothermal purposes), as long-term effects of such activity are not investigated. In an active shale gas extraction area, about 0.1-0.5 litres of chemicals are injected per square metre. The present privileges of oil and gas exploration and extraction should be reassessed in view of the fact that the environmental risks and burdens are not compensated for by a corresponding potential benefit as a specific gas production is very low.” The question is who in Ukraine needs such a rush and negligence of environmental protection and rights of local communities. Is it possible that somebody far away will get and distribute all profits while common people will live without water on devastated lands?
See: http://epl.org.ua/en/news/annotation/backPid/1/article/4781/
