CITIZEN POWER ALLIANCE

CORNING -- Chris Tate of Hector believes hydro-fracturing, a process used in extracting natural gas from the Marcellus Shale formation, is an environmental disaster waiting to happen.

On the other hand, Mike Gustina of Hornby would have no problem allowing drilling on his property.

Both men were among about 400 people who crowded into the auditorium at Corning-Painted Post East High School on Wednesday evening for the fourth and final public hearing on the Department of Environmental Conservation's draft for state regulation of the drilling process.

The DEC has already held three other hearings -- in Sullivan County, in New York City and in the Binghamton area.

At issue is the safety hydro-fracturing (or fracking), a process that involves pumping millions of gallons of water and other fluid deep into rock formations to tap into massive natural gas deposits.

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A debate raging across the state took center stage in Corning on Wednesday evening as the state Department of Environmental Conservation held a public hearing on its new regulations for natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale.

Hundreds crowded the auditorium at Corning East High School, and dozens spoke passionately about their concerns. Many drew loud applause as others held up signs protesting the impending drilling boom in the Southern Tier, television cameras rolled and police officers watched.

The controversy centers around the Marcellus, a deep underground, previously untapped formation thought to contain the richest supply of gas in North America. Thousands of new wells are expected across upstate New York, and drilling them requires massive amounts of water mixed with toxic chemicals.

The process generates huge amounts of waste water and has been linked to a wide array of environmental problems. Opponents say the Marcellus boom will be on a much larger scale than drilling that has occurred here in the past, with heavy truck traffic and big areas of land being bulldozed.

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ITHACA -- Residents are being invited to add their voices to the controversial conversation about state gas drilling regulations in a series of events Thursday.

The first is a rally, set for the Bernie Milton Pavilion on the Ithaca Commons from 4:30-6:30 p.m. Local and state legislators will take the microphone alongside several environmental experts and a few musical acts.

It will be followed at 7 p.m. by a public hearing at the State Theatre.

Doors will open at 6 p.m., and several ground rules have been set. Those wishing to speak will be expected to sign in, and will be called in the order registered. There will be a three-minute time limit on oral statements, which may be supplemented with written comments.

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Cayuga Heights has no plans to accept gas drilling wastewater in the foreseeable future, Mayor Jim Gilmore said Tuesday.

"Not in the near future, and based on what we know today, not even in the distant future. But I think it's a subject we'll probably have to revisit. Probably the industry will force us to," Gilmore said. "Already in the last couple months I've had private entities come to me and talk about processing drill water and I told them we're not in the business of accepting drill water at this time."

The village's wastewater plant, which discharges into Cayuga Lake, began accepting wastewater from conventional gas drilling in May 2008.

The Journal reported the plant was doing so in mid-March, and in early April the village decided to temporarily stop accepting the material pending the results of an analysis on the wastewater plant.

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The New York State Public Service Commission will hold a public statement hearing in Lebanon Wednesday night to solicit feedback on a proposed natural gas pipeline.

The 8.2-mile steel pipeline built by Norse Energy Corp., previously known as Nornew Inc., would run through the towns of Eaton and Lebanon, parallel to an existing plastic line. It would be buried up to four feet below the ground, crossing farmland, forests, wetlands, roads and several brooks and streams.

Norse Spokesman Dennis Holbrook said the project is the next step in the developer’s work in the area. The initial plastic pipeline served during the company’s initial exploration, transporting natural gas at a low pressure.

The high-pressure steel pipeline is an upgrade that will allow the developer to move more gas from its wells in Madison County and the neighboring Chenango County township of Smyrna to a compressor station in Eaton.

“You tend to start smaller,” Holbrook said. “When you have more gas to move, you want to move it more efficiently. It makes sense to plan for the future.”

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Elmira, N.Y.

A court appearance is scheduled for mid-December on a recent legal action filed by a citizens’ group against the Schlum-berger project in Horseheads.

State Supreme Court Justice Judith O’Shea is scheduled to review the case at 9:30 a.m. Dec. 18 at the Chemung County Courthouse in Elmira.

O’Shea will consider a legal action filed by Ithaca attorney and environmental activist Helen Slottje on behalf of a group of area residents calling itself People for a Healthy Environment.

She will also hear a response from Schlumberger, and from the village of Horseheads, the lead agency in the project’s review.

The citizens’ group has been fighting Schlumberger’s $49 million facility in The Center at Horseheads industrial park, which will provide materials and services to the region’s natural gas drilling industry.

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The New York Court of Appeals has held that a person who can demonstrate greater enjoyment of a natural resource than the general public has standing under the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) to challenge an action by a governmental entity which may threaten such a natural resource. In Matter of Save the Pine Bush v Common Council of the City of Albany, the Court held that both the individual petitioners and the organization had standing to challenge an action that allegedly threatened certain endangered species within the Pine Bush area. However, the Court also found that Petitioners had failed to prove their case on the merits as the City had examined the major potential impacts and the City "was not required to scrutinize every possible environmental issue, and the failure of the City's environmental impact statement (EIS) to discuss the possible impact of rezoning on certain rare species was therefore not a fatal flaw."

The project at issue involved a rezoning for a proposed hotel that would not be in a protected area but is near a protected area which is habitat for the Karner Blue butterfly. The draft scope of the proposed EIS included examination of the potential impacts on the Karner Blue butterfly but no other plant or animal species. In response to the draft scope a number of comments were submitted. Among the comments was one from the New York DEC which discussed the Karner Blue and pointed out that the Karner Blue is in a habitat which is known to support four other "rare or unusual species...Frosted Elfin butterfly, the Hognosed Snake, the Worm Snake and the Eastern Spadefoot Toad." The DEC asked that the investigation encompass those species as well.

The DEIS was prepared and included a discussion of the Karner Blue butterfly, including a report by a biologist who stated that repeated visits to the site failed to disclose any Karner Blue butterflies at the site. There was no mention of the other species raised in the DEC comments. The DEIS was commented upon by a number of agencies including the DEC. Other than what the court characterized as brief comments on the Frosted Elfin butterfly and a reference to the Adder's Mouth Orchid (which had not been mentioned previously) there was no mention of the other species previously raised by the DEC.

The report of the biologist was supplemented to respond to comments on the DEIS. He stated the Frosted Elfin butterfly is "'likely to occur in the same places as Karner blue butterflies'; that the plants on which it is known to feed 'are absent or rare in the Albany Pine Bush'; and that he observed no Frosted Elfins on the proposed hotel site. He also listed all the plants he observed growing on the site; the Adder's Mouth Orchid was not among them. Like the commenters on the DEIS, he said nothing about the Hognosed Snake, the Worm Snake or the Eastern Spadefoot Toad." Thereafter the FEIS was accepted and the zone change was approved.

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Two public hearings this week on gas exploration and proposed drilling regulations will be webcast live at www.ithacajournal.com.

To view the hearings, log on towww.ithacajournal.com a few minutes prior to the start of the sessions. Information on how to connect to the stream will be in the home page.

Hearings this week are:

* Wednesday, Nov. 18: DEC official public hearing, Corning East High School auditorium, 201 Cantigny Street, 7 p.m.

* Thursday, Nov. 19: Tompkins County Council of Governments hearing, State Theatre, 107 W. State St., Ithaca, 7 p.m.

Twenty-two states ban corporate spending in state candidate races, and gubernatorial contests are underway in 17 of them. Fourteen are rated as competitive by election handicappers, such as The Cook Political Report.

"The Supreme Court decision has the potential to open the floodgates," said Paul Ryan, of the non-profit Campaign Legal Center, which supports campaign-finance restrictions.

More New York homeowners than ever want to put solar panels on their houses.

That should be good news for the 174 contractors registered with the state to install solar photovoltaic systems. But the demand has put such a strain on subsidies for residential solar that the state has reduced the amount offered, hoping to make a dwindling pot of money last through the end of the year.

A new round of funding for 2010 and beyond has not yet been approved, and that leaves solar power installers hanging. They can’t sign up customers until they know what the subsidy will be. And without customers, an emerging industry employing between 800 and 1,000 people statewide can’t create more “green-collar” jobs.

“We could easily hire another person if the right incentives were in place,” said Duncan Cooper, director of sales for Renovus Energy Inc. in Ithaca, an installer of renewable energy systems that employs seven. “We just don’t know where we’re going to be in the next few months.”

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