California workers succeeded in plugging a major natural gas leak on Thursday, February 18. The leak began in October and lasted five months before workers succeeded in capping it. Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency after 30,000 locals evacuated.
The origins of the leak trace back to 1979. Then, a Southern California Gas Company (SoCal Gas) inspector removed a safety valve due to wear. Claiming it was difficult to find a new part, and the well not being “critical” at the time, it was never replaced.
“Critical” here meaning “not within 100 feet of a local town.”
Cut to 36 years later. The leak spewed almost 100,000 metric tons of greenhouse gasses since it began in October. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and California Air Resources Board (CARB), a single US vehicle would have to drive 16.2 billion miles constantly to achieve a similar effect. TIME magazine compared this to 4.5 million cars being driven non-stop in one day. It is worse than the last major pollution incident, the 2011 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
“Is it a shock that it failed?” asked UC Davis scientist Steve Conley, who flew a plane to measure the gas leak.
The gasses aren’t expected to remain in the atmosphere as long as long as other polluting gasses. The amounts released into the atmosphere, though, are cause for concern. The California Environmental Protection Agency estimates it will have an impact up to thousands of times greater than Carbon Dioxide, a known greenhouse gas.
Situations like this are becoming far too common, and for the same reasons.
Politicians have been calling for the diminishing of Environmental Protection Agency regulations for years. One such politician is Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) who in January 2014, said one of his goals was, “to do whatever I can to get the EPA reined in.” In 2015, Republicans and Democrats passed a bill that effectively limits the EPA’s functions.
A situation like this is a perfect illustration of why they are essential.
But this is not a recent problem.
This is one of a number of highly publicized similar incidents in three corners of the country. The BP Oil Spill and Flint, Michigan’s water crisis also reinforce this point. But what about the Northeast?
The case of Donora, Pennsylvania, is one to consider. If it sounds inconspicuous, think again. Environmentalists consider it home to one of the worst pollution incidents in the nation’s history.
In October 1948, a massive smog cloud rolled into the Pennsylvania town. Residents were familiar with smog from the two factories owned by the United States Steel Company. What brought it from unhealthy to deadly was unusual weather phenomena that led to warm air mixing with polluted air. It lasted for five days.
It took a day’s worth of rain to bring an end to the crisis. By then, 20 of the town’s 14,000 residents had died of respiratory illnesses. Another 50 followed a month later. Almost half the town remained sick from respiratory disease.
Epidemiologist and author Devra Davis lived in Donora and was two at the time. “It was the first time that people really understood that a lot of air pollution in a short period of time could kill people,” she said. Davis wrote about air pollution in her 2002 book, “When Smoke Ran Like Water.”
The Donora smog incident served to help push forward the Clean Air Act in 1970.
US Steel have yet to answer for their role in the event. Their only response has been to call the incident an “act of God.”
Today, Donora houses a museum to commemorate the event. It proudly bears the slogan, “Clean Air Started Here.”
Sources & References- http://www.arb.ca.gov/research/aliso_canyon/community_methane_monitoring.htm
- http://www.arb.ca.gov/research/aliso_canyon_natural_gas_leak.htm
- http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35258036
- http://www.caloes.ca.gov/ICESite/Pages/Aliso-Canyon.aspx
- http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/18/us/gas-well-leak-capped-porter-ranch-california/index.html
- http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/6/24/1396303/-Which-8-Democrats-Just-Voted-to-Effectively-Repeal-the-EPA-s-Clean-Power-Plan
- http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/e2-wire/223398-senate-gop-steeling-for-battle-against-the-epa
- http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-porter-ranch-update-20160209-story.html
- http://www.laweekly.com/news/what-went-wrong-at-porter-ranch-6405804
- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103359330
- http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/02/us/02smog.html?_r=0http://www.post-gazette.com/neighborhoods/2008/10/21/Museum-remembers-Donora-s-deadly-1948-smog/stories/200810210140
- http://qz.com/616369/californias-gas-leak-is-finally-capped-but-the-next-disaster-could-be-right-around-the-corner/
- http://time.com/4180692/california-methane-gas-leak-environment/
- http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/environment/article53629265.html
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