Stop the fracked gas export terminal in the Delaware River, Mark Ruffalo

This is Mark Ruffalo—actor, environmental activist, and MoveOn member. After the past three and a half years of the Trump administration, very little surprises me. It horrifies me, but doesn't surprise me. When I heard Donald Trump approved a dangerous and untested plan to transport fracked gas from northeast Pennsylvania to New Jersey, I was not surprised.¹

What did surprise me was the fact that four Democratic governors—governors of New Jersey, New York, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, who promised to follow the climate change science and be climate leaders—have been going along with Trump's fracking plan.

This dangerous plan will allow a company called New Fortress Energy to take fracked gas from the Marcellus Shale in northeast Pennsylvania to export overseas.² New Fortress Energy will liquify the gas and transport it nearly 200 miles by trucks and by rail to export from a facility in southern New Jersey, only a short distance south of Philadelphia, PA.³ New Fortress Energy is attempting to get fast-track approval to transport the gas by trucks and rail tank cars to circumvent lengthy federal regulatory reviews that would require more public input.

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, Delaware Governor John Carney, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers must stop the fracked gas export terminal in the Delaware River.

Health experts, scientists, and first responders are warning about the many ways this fracking project threatens public health and safety.

The governors must reject the Trump administration's very dangerous fracking plan at their meeting this Thursday.

The Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) was established in 1961 by the Kennedy administration and the governments of Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York to protect this vital river basin.⁴ Yet right now the DRBC is failing to live up to its mandate—it approved the fracking project without looking at the facts or providing the public with an adequate comment period to express concerns and expert testimony.⁵

This fracking plan is atrocious for many reasons. It will set a dangerous national precedent for the transportation of extremely volatile fracked gas by trucks and trains to export the gas overseas. It reinforces the production of gas at a time when many states are working to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

It threatens the Delaware River Basin, which is a source of water for over 15 million people (about 4% of the entire U.S. population).⁶ It will damage the river's ecosystem that includes the endangered Atlantic sturgeon and freshwater mussels.⁷

The liquified gas is highly flammable. It burns so hot that people and animals can get second-degree burns up to a mile away. Because it burns so hot, it's inextinguishable.⁸ And it's explosive. It can turn into rapidly expanding clouds of vapor that can flash-freeze human flesh and asphyxiate by displacing oxygen.⁹ Transporting liquified gas is a terrible danger: Just one rail tank car could destroy an entire city.¹⁰

I love the Delaware River and my neighbors who live along it. Will you help us by signing my petition calling on the governors to immediately halt this horrible and harmful fracking project?

Click here to add your name to my petition, and then pass it along to your friends.

Thanks!

–Mark Ruffalo

Sources:

1. "Executive Order on Promoting Energy Infrastructure and Economic Growth," The White House, April 10, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/143599?t=11&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

2. "Water Regulator Defends OK of Plan to Build LNG Export Terminal in South Jersey," NJ Spotlight, May 13, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/143597?t=13&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

3. "What You Should Know About Liquefied Natural Gas and Rail Cars," Earthjustice, August 18, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/143600?t=15&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

4. "Water Regulator Defends OK of Plan to Build LNG Export Terminal in South Jersey," NJ Spotlight, May 13, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/143597?t=17&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

5. "Contentious plan to remake N.J. dynamite plant into shale-gas export terminal is approved," The Philadelphia Inquirer, June 12, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/143598?t=19&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

6. "New DRBC Panel to Focus on Sea-Level Rise as Salt Front Threatens Drinking Water," NJ Spotlight, August 13, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/143859?t=21&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

7. "Riverkeepers' Delaware River paddle focuses on endangered sturgeon," Courier Times, May 28, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/143603?t=23&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

8. "Letter to DRBC Regarding Gibbstown, NJ Export Facility," Concerned Health Professionals of NY, September 3, 2020
http://act.moveon.org/go/143601?t=25&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d

9. Ibid.

10. "What You Should Know About Liquefied Natural Gas and Rail Cars," Earthjustice, August 18, 2020

https://act.moveon.org/go/143600?t=27&akid=273251%2E3735812%2E1vgJ7d 

TO: New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, Delaware Governor John Carney, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf, Army Corps of Engineers

Stop the fracked gas export terminal in the Delaware River

Campaign created by

Mark Ruffalo

Campaign created by

Mark Ruffalo

Please sign the petition here to the Army Corps of Engineers and the governors of New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Delaware to stop the fracked gas export terminal in the Delaware River at their next meeting on Thursday, September 10th.

Why is this important?

The Delaware River Basin Commission was established in 1961 by the Governors of your states and President Kennedy to protect this vital river basin that provides drinking water for over 15 million people. Yet right now the DRBC is failing to live up to its mandate with New Fortress Energy’s Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) export terminal project that will set a dangerous national precedent for the transportation of extremely volatile fracked gas by trucks and rail tank cars to export the gas overseas.
The company is using the Delaware River as it’s testing grounds for an expedited plan to get around federal safety regulations instead planning to send hundreds of trucks and rail tank cars per day across the river watershed for export overseas from the site of an old DuPont munitions plant in Gibbstown, NJ.

Trump signed an Executive Order last year to fastrack LNG by rail and his administration issued a special permit for this project.

The DRBC wrongfully approved this project without looking at all the facts or providing the public with adequate input to express concerns and expert testimony over a year ago. This project has been cloaked in secrecy. Recently in July, the DRBC’s Hearing Officer ruled that they had done nothing wrong in handling this permit application or approval after formally hearing the case from a regional organization - Delaware Riverkeeper Network. The DRBC Hearing Officer ignored the potential impacts that this project can have on the water quality of the river including how the proposed site for the export terminal has PCBs and how these and other pollutants at the site could be disturbed by dredging the river.

Furthermore, concerns about disturbance of pollution from the old DuPont munitions plant, including contamination with toxic and carcinogenic nitrobenzene, and others such as aniline, and mercury, have not been adequately addressed. The Hearing Officer also refused to accurately consider impacts on the ecosystem of the river including the federally endangered Atlantic sturgeon, rare freshwater mussels and their habitats at this location.

Lastly, the DRBC refuses to look at the impact the over 1600 truck trips and up to two 100-car trainloads of LNG per day could have to the river basin as well as public safety. If there is a release of LNG in an accident, the fire burns so hot it can’t be extinguished, the vapor cloud can explode and cause catastrophic damage for miles, and people nearby can die. In fact, 22 rail tank cars have the equivalent force of the Hiroshima bomb.

Thousands of people are speaking out. A large group of doctors and health experts and scientists have written about the dangers of the facility to public health. Let’s heed their warning.

We ask you to reject the Hearing Officer’s findings, rescind the existing permit and stop this project!

PETITION