Twenty states now require companies to disclose the chemicals they use in the hydraulic fracturing process used to pry gas and oil from tight geological formations. But, as part of the omnibus Energy Modernization Act, SB 786, North Carolina Republicans want to impose civil and criminal penalties, including prison time, on anyone who makes such a disclosure.
The bill has nine co-sponsors, all of them Republicans. Both houses of the state legislature have Republican super-majorities.
Molly Redden at Mother Jones reports:
- "The felony provision is far stricter than most states' provisions in terms of the penalty for violating trade secrets," says Hannah Wiseman, a Florida State University assistant law professor who studies fracking regulations.
The bill also allows companies that own the chemical information to require emergency responders to sign a confidentiality agreement. And it's not clear what the penalty would be for a health care worker or fire chief who spoke about their experiences with chemical accidents to colleagues.
"I think the only penalties to fire chiefs and doctors, if they talked about it at their annual conference, would be the penalties contained in the confidentiality agreement," says Wiseman. "But [the bill] is so poorly worded, I cannot confirm that if an emergency responder or fire chief discloses that confidential information, they too would not be subject to a felony."
this is why they want ability to legislate to go back to the states, this is what they mean by gov't standing in their way it's called regulations designed to protect us from them. what are they hiding why such harsh penalty's on something that should be public knowledge if they feel the need to hide the ingredients from us speaks more to the legitimacy of what they are doing than gov't intrusion, understand with out those gov't agencies to protect us they would run rampant with all sorts of pollution and chemical exposing's.
