Blog

By Barbara W. Brandom, MD

https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2024/05/pennsylvania-biden-administration-hydrogen-hubs-community-benefits-public-input/), with the title, “Communities fear health, environmental harms as they await more info on hydrogen hub projects”. There have been six so called Listening Sessions held virtually by the federal Office of Clean Energy Development (OCED), https://www.energy.gov/oced/about-us’, and ‘https://www.energy.gov/oced/h2hubs-local-engagement-opportunities’, to allow public opportunities to speak about the anticipated developments in Pennsylvania, MACH2 (Mid Atlantic Clean Hydrogen Hub) and ARCH2 (Appalachian Clean Hydrogen Hub). The next step will be awarding contracts to companies that meet the goals of OCED. Federal funds, perhaps to be awarded as soon as June 2024, will be met by private investors and construction will begin. So far this process has allowed no real estimates regarding the anticipated increases in air, water, light and sound pollution in Pennsylvania and the surrounding states.

ARCH2 will certainly use fracked gas to make hydrogen and jet fuel, at least. Plans are being made for this industrial development near the Pittsburgh International Airport. If it could include 100% carbon capture, this could be profitable due to the current tax credits. This degree of efficiency of carbon capture at a smoke stack has not been obtained. Original plans for MACH2 did not include using methane as a feed stock for hydrogen. However, during a MACH2 listening session a developer asked if hydrogen generating facilities outside the MACH2 hub would be held to the same standards as those within it. Perhaps he plans to use methane as a feedstock for hydrogen and take advantage of the hydrogen infrastructure built for MACH2. In any case creating methane chemically is an energy intensive process which in Pennsylvania would encourage gas fired electricity generation. Fracking and all its problems of management of highly radioactive and chemically toxic waste would increase.

The listening sessions were supposed to demonstrate Community involvement in the development of this industry. I listened to 3 of these sessions and spoke at one. Almost all of the people I heard discussed why they do not want to see ARCH2 or MACH2 built.

These people are familiar with the harms of fracking. One speaker noted the Compendium on Harms of Fracking (https://concernedhealthny.org/compendium/). For over 20 years (https://paenvironmentdaily.blogspot.com) their lives have been poisoned by fracking and other petrochemical industries. The most recent documentation of this is the book, Petroleum-238, by investigative journalist Justin Nobel.

     If ARCH2 and MACH2 are built here will be more fracking and more radioactive, toxic fracking waste to be disposed of as it if were not harming our health. There will also be many more pipelines, to deliver carbon dioxide to sequestration sites and to deliver hydrogen to industries that can use it instead of fossil fuels, https://paenvironmentdaily.blogspot.com/2024/01/no-false-solutions-pa-coalition-issues.html?lr=1716680429708. These pipelines must differ from those that carried fossil gas (methane), because CO2 and H2, have different physiochemical properties from methane. Inadequate pipeline construction and maintenance and impact by land instability following flooding and landslides will produce pipeline ruptures and explosions that will be much more devastating to us than what we have experienced from fossil gas.

There are tax credits to companies that demonstrated they have put supercritical carbon dioxide underground. But there has never been a demonstration that this CO2 will stay put. In fact the international company based in Norway, Equinor, built three carbon sequestration projects, (https://ieefa.org/resources/norways-sleipner-and-snohvit-ccs-industry-models-or-cautionary-tales, Figure 3, page 20, and Table 1: Unexpected Developments in Norway’s Model CCS Projects, page 32.) none of which met the stated storage goals and in each of which the CO2 plume moved to unexpected places.

The biologist and environmental scientist, Dr. Sandra Steingraber spoke about the biologic effects of CO2 in high concentrations, (https://x.com/ssteingraber1/status/1786779754877563132) such as those that occur when CO2 escapes from ruptured pipelines or sequestration sites. Rapidly internal combustion engines stall, people start coughing, convulsing, and dying. If a person is pulled out of this cloud of expanding CO2 they may recover only to find that permanent brain damage has created total dependency. Such injury was recognized to have occurred occurred in Satartia, (https://www.phmsa.dot.gov/sites/phmsa.dot.gov/files/2022-05/Failure%20Investigation%20Report%20-%20Denbury%20Gulf%20Coast%20Pipeline.pdf), only because of followup visits by the investigative reporter.

The proposed laws in Pennsylvania (SB831) do not require any compensation to the landowner if such personal injuries occur or if there is damage to built structures from the plume of carbon dioxide approaching the surface.

Tracy Carluccio, Deputy Director of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network (DRN) spoke clearly. She said, if OCED listens to our communities they will cancel MACH2. The residents in western PA, Ohio and West Virginia agree with her. Not only will methane be used to make hydrogen, but it will be used to supply the great quantities of energy required for this industry. By the way a lot of water is also needed. The engineers and scientists, such as Mark Jacobson, Robert Howarth, Sandra Steingraber, and many others agree with economists that hydrogen development is a waste of resources. Hydrogen will further, because of its own chemistry as well as the concomitant great increase in methane (https://delawareriverkeeper.org/issues/climate-change-fossil-fuels-and-energy/mid-atlantic-hydrogen-hub/) and CO2 release, accelerate global warming in our life times. DRN will host webinars and forums to share what we are learning and opportunities for action. See DNR, our website Home Page, for dates and how to participate.