Keep Marcellus Shale gas drilling out of Pocahontas County WV

It seems that the gas extraction companies have their sites set on Pocahontas County WV. Many people are already aware of the environmental damge caused by the horizontal drilling for natural gas.

It can take as much as 5 million gallons of fresh water to fracture each well, and the process of drilling itself often poisons or depletes usuable groundwater from neighboring surface owner's drinking wells. Due to the "trade secrets" exemption, companies do not have to reveal the actual "fracking" chemicals used in the process of drilling, but common ones include liquid carbon dioxide, liquid nitrogen, crude oil, and kerosene amongst others. Who will answer for allowing "Nature's Mountain Playground" to become Natural Gas Industry's profit fueled wasteland?

With many people in Pocahontas County not owning the mineral rights to the land they live on and farm, and the ones who do sell recieving measly compensation for the future destruction of their land and water, any profit lies solely in the pocketbooks of the gas companies. Noise pollution, polluted streams, poisoned and depleted wells, ruined pastures and carelessly built roads do not have to be our future.

We can use the services of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund to keep natural gas drilling out of Pocahontas county.