Irony Alert: Pennsylvania Fracking Operation Stopped due to Drought
April 20, 2012
Low stream flows have forced officials to suspend water usage for the natural gas development (fracking) in portions of Pennsylvania.
A lack of snowfall this winter and a lack of rain this spring were the major players in abnormally low stream flows, low ground water levels and depleted soil moisture.
According to a report published by the Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SBRC), 17 separate water withdrawals were temporarily suspended.
The suspension, initiated to mitigate plunging stream flows in the basin affects 10 companies in five Pennsylvania counties. Those counties are Bradford, Luzerne, Lycoming, Susquehanna and Tioga.
Additional withdrawals may be suspended if rainfall continues to trend below normal.
According to officials, the restrictions are applied to various streams when flow rates reach a certain threshold and do not wait for declaration of a drought.
The abnormally dry conditions have also resulted in an elevated and extended wildfire season this year.
While a storm is forecast to bring some rain to the region this weekend, more rain (not in excess) is needed on a regular basis to reverse the building drought conditions.
April 20, 2012 at 4:42 am
[...] background-position: 50% 0px ; background-color:#222222; background-repeat : no-repeat; } climatecrocks.com – Today, 11:42 [...]
April 20, 2012 at 11:08 am
Today I was measuring streamflow in Central Massachusetts streams seven of the eight had the lowest flow for any day in April during there entire record of observations. The observations extended back to 1913, 1929, 1934, , 1942 and 1962 on various streams.
April 20, 2012 at 5:37 pm
=> Fracking Ireland
April 22, 2012 at 2:28 pm
Is it too much to hope that oil exploration in the Arctic could be halted due to excessive amounts of sea ice and or ice shelf fragmentation?
April 23, 2012 at 5:41 am
Martin, I suspect that some people haven’t put that ice reduction thingy into perspective.
Less sea ice, oh goody, let’s get up there pronto.
More and bigger chunks splitting off the glaciers more often floating more freely in less congested waters, whoops, another Titanic moment. But our drilling rig can’t move out of the way.
April 23, 2012 at 5:43 am
As for stopping fracking for lack of water. Yet another hot beverage nasal damage moment.
April 26, 2012 at 5:59 pm
[...] 2012/04/20: PSinclair: Irony Alert: Pennsylvania Fracking Operation Stopped due to Drought [...]