ALEC Slips Exxon Fracking Loopholes into New Ohio Law

[limpyhobbler]

(cross-posted from GD)

Wake up and smell the frack fluid! But don't ask what's in it, at least not in Ohio, cause it's still not your right to know.

Ohio is in the final stages of making an Exxon trojan horse on hydrofracking into state law, and it appears that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) connected Exxon's lawyers with co-sponsors of Ohio Senate Bill 315: at least 33 of the 45 Ohio legislators who co-sponsored SB 315 are ALEC members, and language from portions of the state Senate bill is similar to ALEC's "Disclosure of Hydraulic Fracturing Fluid Composition Act."

...disclosure of fracking fluids? On behalf of ExxonMobil?!

Frack fluids include unknown chemicals that gas drillers mix with sand and large amounts of water. The mixture is pumped underground at high pressure in order to retrieve gas and oil by fracturing shale formations. These are the chemicals that have caused widespread concern among residents near gas fracking operations, concerns echoed by doctors who don't know how to treat patients harmed by exposure to chemicals that oil companies keep secret. Oil companies like XTO Energy, a subsidiary of ExxonMobil, the first company lined up to drill in Ohio's Utica shale.

Concern over unconventional energy like gas fracking may be the reason why Ohio SB 315 also addresses clean energy standards and drilling regulations. While the new law will allow doctors to obtain disclosure of fracking chemicals, it places a gag order on them ... meaning some chemicals aren't disclosed to the public at all (Cleveland Plain Dealer). Instead, chemicals that subsidiaries of Big Oil use during fracking can remain exempt from public disclosure as "trade secrets," mirroring language of ALEC's model law.
...

complete piece: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/05/11556/alec-slips-exxon-fracking-loopholes-new-ohio-law

[DontTreadOnMe]

1. What's wrong with Americans?

How do LAWS just get "slipped in"... are WE really not paying attention. What happened to the American PRess, which is supposed to INFORM US about what is going on... just makes me really pissed.