Daily Report 9-4-2014 - Anti-frackers Find an Audience!
The Tuscaloosa Marine Shale Play has been a fascinating thing to me.
I've told my story before about becoming consciously aware of the Tuscaloosa Marine Shale in 2011 and beginning to learn about hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling at that time.
You see, I have ancestors who lived along River Road and Wall Street Road in Amite County and family land had passed down through the years until some of it became mine a few years ago. I've visited the area since I was a child, been a pall bearer at relatives funerals, attended church events, cut and planted trees, and visited with friends and relatives in the area for over 50 years now.
The Lea Cemetery on River Road is known as one of the oldest in Amite County. I can't name them (Hey, I'm not that old!), but there are almost certainly relatives of mine buried there who were born in the 1700's.
So, when this new thing called fracking hit my radar, I did research. I didn't want my property or my ancestors property destroyed by some process that would only serve to make greedy people rich. I'm happy to have an extra dollar or two just like anyone else is, but some things are worth more than money to me.
My 200 year old heritage, along with my children, grandchildren, and, I'm hoping, many generations to follow is among the things that money would pale in comparison.
Consequently, I studied fracking.
No, I don't mean I went to google to learn all about it, although I certainly did do a lot of online research. What I mean when I say I studied fracking is that I ended up talking to the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, to a petroleum engineer actively involved in fracking elsewhere in the U. S., but who has property and relatives in Amite County, to people who had seen frackiing done in our area for many, many years...(I was shocked to learn it really wasn't a new thing). I read the LSU TMS study. I talked to folks who had their wells fractured in Amite County a few years earlier. I read all the negatives I could find on the subject.
I studied fracking.
And, as a result, I became satisfied that when the rules are followed fracking posed no harm to me, the land or present people in the area, or the generations to follow.
That said, I attempt to listen to and respect the opinions of those who oppose fracking. It is always possible I've missed something in my studies. I don't wish to be negative, but for the most part I haven't encountered many people opposed to fracking who know much about what they are opposing.
I am actually a bit of an oddball, because most folks in our little part of the world don't listen much to the anti-frackers.
So, I suppose that is why a group of anti-frackers, said to have traveled to Amite County from the New Orleans area, set up at the Lea Cemetery to protest today.
They finally found someone willing to listen!
Below is a picture of Lea Cemetery in the foreground and the Anderson 18H-1 well about the time it was being set up to be fractured in April of 2012. I don't know if the anti-fracture group was aware of just how late they were, but protesting something nearly 2 1/2 years after it has been finished doesn't make a lot of sense to me. And, in a cemetery?!? What's up with that?
I hope you don't mind me sharing the story. It was just too bizarre to keep to myself.
