20140957 Ver 2_Public Notice Comments_20170727 (38)

Strickland, Bev
From:Nancy Corson Carter <[e-mail]>
Sent:Thursday, July 27, 2017 9:30 AM
To:SVC_DENR.publiccomments
Cc:Nancy Corson Carter
Subject:ACP comment
For the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality Division of Water Resources:

I have been following the course of fracking in relation to NC well before the one mis-read vote in the NC GA led our
state into accepting it (it was a tragedy to refuse the correction of the vote in my mind!)

I am well aware that fracking is the “poster child” of the moment for non-renewable energy folks who flaunt its dubious
promise of many jobs and great paybacks for those who agree to make the most of the eminent domain buyout money
for themselves—a one-time payout that many cannot help but rue in the future. I suppose most of you have also been
aware of the not-false-news events surrounding fracking like earthquakes, spills, and ruination of water supplies,
sometimes right into irreplaceable and non-renewable aquifers. This is not to mention the continuing racism involved in
denying Native People their sacred lands by trampling over them willy-nilly and ignoring their often “wiser-than-the-
whites” considerations of how to keep the Earth sustainable, not desecrating its resources for future as well as present
generations.

My plea would be for you all to consider the long view. Just how much land and how much water and even clean air are
you willing to sacrifice, all the way from West Virginia through VA and NC and onward to the Great God of Fracking?
How long do you really think this energy gold rush will last? How deeply true is the promise of mega jobs? How many
family farms do you want to put on the chopping block?

Then there are the 453 acres of wetland and the 326 streams and rivers the pipeline would cross as it rams through 8 NC
counties. These natural resources are not ones humans can re-create; they are ones we need to keep NC safe and clean
in a whole-Earth way. Our human arrogance blinds us to the absolutely interdependent relationship we have with such
powerfully important parts of our environment. And the fact that we have allowed the arrogance to march ahead in
destroying so much of our wetlands and clean waters makes the remaining ones all the more precious, all the more
necessary. But surely you know all that!

Fracking is ugly. I have seen pictures. Fracking is noisy and uncertain—it’s not good to have those gases or their
pipelines close to homes, to schools, to anywhere that humans reside and work. That’s for W VA to figure out. But we in
NC ARE connected. Provide a pipeline and you perpetuate the wrong at the source. Renewable energy is coming; the
world is increasingly understanding that this is an important way to keep the Earth we all depend upon sustainable.
Short term thinking, which the ACP surely represents, is a bad gamble. When the worst happens, as it statistically will,
we will have a ruined landscape and people who are betrayed by hopeful and perhaps even fraudulent hype.

Renewables are the wave of the future, a promise that’s already coming to fruition in some enlightened places in NC.
Fracking is a “flash in the pan” that could easily blow up. Why risk this with so much time and money when real hope for
the future lies elsewhere—IF ONLY WE HAVE THE WILL; IF ONLY WE HAVE THE COURAGE AND CREATIVITY that’s God-
given to us.

Thanks for your consideration. I will be watching this issue carefully and hoping that the loudest, most heavily invested
voices do not drown out the ones of long-range wisdom.

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Nancy Corson Carter, Ph.D.
2516 Cedronella Dr.
Chapel Hill, NC 27514
[e-mail]

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that
ever has. -Margaret Mead

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