Sign the Petition!

Click Here to sign a petition respectfully demanding that Cochecton's Town Board and Planning Board return to the drafting process and further amend the Zoning Law to protect residents from the dangers of High Volume Hydrofracture.

Click Here to sign an agreement not to lease your land for natural gas with horizontal hydrofracture.

Click Here to read the joint press release from Keep Cochecton Green and Catskill Citizens for Safe Energy.

Currently the most pressing issue for residents of the Town of Cochecton, as well as the rest of Sullivan County is natural gas drilling. This area sits atop the Marcellus Shale which stretches from western Pennsylvania thru Sullivan County. The shale contains natural gas which can be accessed thru vertical and horizontal drilling and a process called "fracking" which was developed by Halliburton.

Fracking requires the injection of huge amounts of water, sand and chemicals into the ground to fracture the shale and allow the natural gas to escape. Some of the chemicals used in the process have been identified and include know carcinogens but, because the fracking process is exempt from EPA regulations including the Safe Drinking Water Act, the drilling companies do not have to disclose the chemicals they are using.

So as a result neither the government not its citizens are fully informed as to all the risks created by this process. But it is known that there are enormous environmental and health risks with the contamination of aquifers, springs, rivers and streams as well as atmospheric pollution from escaping gases. Shale drilling and fracking has been used in Colorado, Wyoming and Texas and there is sufficient evidence from these operations to know the environmental degradation that is part and parcel of this heavy industry.

Read Keep Cochecton Green's Presentations to the Cochecton Planning Board