Jenn Gravert – 8/10/17

 


This page was last updated on August 12, 2017.


Why won’t Shell offer fenceline monitoring?; Jenn Gravert (JG); Beaver County Times; August 10, 2017.

The BCT published a previous Gravert letter I didn’t review.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.


“Shell held a community meeting last week where it pointedly did not allow the residents of Beaver County to openly ask questions and bring up their concerns.

“One of the questions that was not addressed was that of fenceline monitoring.  Shell’s ethane cracker plant is poised to be a top air polluter in the county and in the state.  While Shell has said that this plant will be built with the best and newest technology that the industry has to offer, I’ve noticed that one simple and effective technology has remained overlooked.”

[RWC] “Overlooked?”  By whom?  Here’s an excerpt from a piece published by the BCT and lauded by local opponents of the cracker as “good journalism, well researched.”

“Because the matter is in litigation, DEP community relations coordinator Lauren Fraley couldn’t say much on the issue.  However, Fraley wrote in an email that the DEP does not consider fenceline monitoring for volatile organic compounds [VOCs] or hazardous air pollutants to be necessary at the facility.  In a June 2015 document, the DEP basically argued that Shell’s leak detection and repair program would be more superior in tracing and stopping fugitive gases from leaks and flares than a fenceline system. [Note: The emphasis is mine.]

“The DEP is referring to the type of fenceline system that the Environmental Protection Agency [EPA] is going to require refineries to start using in 2018.  This system monitors emissions of the known carcinogenic benzene.  It is not quite what the Clean Air Council and Environmental Integrity Project are hoping for because it does not gather real-time data of many other emissions, and it doesn’t automatically share any data with the fenceline community.”

The real gripe of the anti-Shell crowd isn’t fence-line monitoring.  Otherwise, why insist on fence-line monitoring when the DEP asserts Shell’s leak detection and repair program would be better than a fenceline system?  The real gripe is the proposed monitoring – fence-line or not - “doesn’t automatically share any data with the fenceline community.”  What these guys want is access to “real-time data” so they can spread their “interpretation” before Shell and/or the DEP can do a proper analysis.

Should Shell go along with fence-line monitoring, the anti-Shell crowd will move the goalpost.  Think Charlie Brown, Lucy, and a football.

I don’t know if it’s an issue in this case, but going “above and beyond” can get a business into legal trouble.  Back in the 1990s, my employer required all employees to attend a “class” on sexual harassment presented by our law department.  Part of the seminar was the presentation of the company’s sexual harassment policy.  The policy was the offending party was responsible for the act, not the company.  The company would be liable only if it didn’t respond to a complaint or ignored obvious policy violations.

This was at the time we started providing Internet access to everyone.  I was already researching router software that would block access to known pornography websites, the keyword being “known.”  Part of the software’s price paid for regular updates to its list of known porn websites.  When my director and I invited our chief counsel for a demo of our plans, we didn’t get the expected response.  Instead of “wow, that will help,” we got “no way, José.”  Why?  Because we would be taking direct measures to prevent porn from getting into the workplace via the Internet, the company could be held liable when the inevitable happened and a piece of Internet porn got by the filter and offended someone.  No good deed goes unpunished.

“Fenceline monitoring is a cost-effective and intuitive solution for safeguarding the air quality around the plant.  It lines the perimeter of the plant and measures emission levels and is particularly important for catching fugitive emissions from the plant.  These emissions can leak from valves and gauges in the towers, as well as at any faulty seams in the construction.”

[RWC] “In a June 2015 document, the DEP basically argued that Shell’s leak detection and repair program would be more superior in tracing and stopping fugitive gases from leaks and flares than a fenceline system.”

“The federal Environmental Protection Agency is considering requiring fenceline monitoring for distilleries, whose process is very similar to that of an ethane cracker.  With such a common-sense option available, why didn’t Shell offer this up at the meeting as a solution to keep the community’s air safe?”

[RWC] “In a June 2015 document, the DEP basically argued that Shell’s leak detection and repair program would be more superior in tracing and stopping fugitive gases from leaks and flares than a fenceline system.”

 “Given the low cost, why hasn’t Shell agreed to be the ‘good neighbor’ and install fenceline monitoring?”

[RWC] Isn’t Shell being a “good neighbor” by implementing a “leak detection and repair program [that] would be more superior in tracing and stopping fugitive gases from leaks and flares than a fenceline system?”


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