On October 18, the FracTracker Alliance announced the winners of the 2023 Community Sentinel Awards to honor the leadership of individuals working to protect communities from the harms of the fossil fuel industry.

The three winners from Pennsylvania are: Gillian Graber, Westmoreland County; Sarah Martin, Washington County; and anaïs peterson, Pittsburgh.

The other winners are Maury Johnson, Greenville, West Virginia and Debra Ramirez, Lake Charles, Louisiana.

Gillian Graber

Gillian Graber, from Harrison City, Westmoreland County, is the executive director and co-founder of Protect Penn-Trafford (Protect PT), a grassroots community-based nonprofit established in 2014 to protect residents of Pennsylvania’s Westmoreland and Allegheny counties from the impacts of fossil fuel activity. As a mother of two, Gillian is passionate about keeping children safe from the impacts of fracking.

Sarah Martik

Sarah Martik, from Canonsburg, Washington County, is the executive director of the Center for Coalfield Justice, where she began working as a community organizer in 2017.

Sarah’s work has spanned a variety of issues and geographies, from organizing in her hometown on a zoning ordinance fight, to helping pull together the regional People Over Petro Coalition, and advocating for a strong, legally-binding global plastics treaty with Break Free From Plastic.

Sarah is motivated to stay in this work for her nieces and nephews, and her fur-baby, Lucy.

anaïs peterson

anaïs peterson, from Pittsburgh, is a petrochemicals campaigner with Earthworks.

anaïs’s work at Earthworks focuses on delaying and defeating petrochemical and crude oil export facilities proposed for Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast and the proposed petrochemical buildout in the Ohio River Valley where anaïs has lived for the past eight years.

Each winner receives $1,000 and the award, and will be recognized at the 2023 Community Sentinel Awards Ceremony.

Awards Ceremony

This year’s event will take place on  November 9, at Phipps Conservatory in Pittsburgh and will be livestreamed for virtual participants.

The event will feature music, art, and keynote speaker Eliza Eliza Evans, the creator of All the Way to Hell, an activist art project for disrupting fossil fuel development.

Many of this year’s nominees and winners were quick to point out that they could not do this work alone.

The Community Sentinel Awards is an opportunity to celebrate the winners, but also the movement for a clean energy future as a whole.

Click Here for more information on attending the awards program.

The Johnstown-based FracTracker Alliance supports groups across the United States, addressing pressing concerns about the health effects and exposure risks to communities from oil and gas development. Click Here to sign up for regular updates.

(Photos: Gillian Graber, Westmoreland County; Sarah Martin, Washington County; and anaïs peterson, Pittsburgh.)

PA Oil & Gas Industry Public Notice Dashboards:

-- Pennsylvania Oil & Gas Weekly Compliance Dashboard - October 14 to 20 - 6 More Abandoned Conventional Wells; Conventional Gas Migration Incident; Inactive Shale Gas Wells [PaEN]

-- PA Oil & Gas Industrial Facilities: Permit Notices/Opportunities To Comment - October 21  [PaEN]

-- DEP Posted 62 Pages Of Permit-Related Notices In October 21 PA Bulletin  [PaEN] 

Related Articles This Week:

-- 9th Compendium Of Studies On Health & Environmental Harms From Natural Gas Development Released - ‘The Rapidly Expanding Body Of Evidence Compiled Here Is Massive, Troubling And Cries Out For Decisive Action’  [PaEN]

-- Gov. Shapiro: We Need Stronger Laws To Deal With The ‘Corporate Greed’ That Let Oil & Gas Operators Get Away With Abandoning Wells For Far Too Long [PaEN]

-- Gov. Shapiro Marks Plugging 100th Conventional Oil & Gas Well In 10 Months; New Initiative Allows Texting Abandoned Well Photos/Locations To Governor That Need Plugging  [PaEN]

-- FracTracker Alliance Recognizes 5 Individuals With The 2023 Community Sentinel Awards - 3 From Pennsylvania  [PaEN]

-- Senate Committee Briefing Finds No Definition Or Standard For ‘Responsibly Sourced’ Natural Gas; PA Producers Already Below One RS Threshold  [PaEN]

-- PA Physicians For Social Responsibility: Methane Leaks From SEPTA Gas Generation Plant, Philadelphia  [Video]

-- Protect PT, Partners Host Oct. 26 Webinar On PFAS 'Forever Chemical' In Pennsylvania's Oil & Gas Production  [PaEN]

-- EPA, West Virginia Officials Working To Secure Fairmount Oil & Gas Wastewater Processing Facility To Prevent Release Of Radioactive, Hazardous Materials  [PaEN]

-- Susquehanna River Basin Commission Holds Nov. 2 Hearing On Water Withdrawal Requests, Including Shale Gas Drilling In Loyalsock, Pine Creek Exceptional Value Watersheds  [PaEN]

-- Susquehanna River Basin Commission Approves 19 Shale Gas Well Pad Water Use General Permits In Bradford, Susquehanna, Tioga Counties  [PaEN]

-- PUC Safety Division Investigating Columbia Gas Service Disruptions To 4,000+ Customers In Beaver County  [PaEN]

-- PUC Updates Investigation Into Dec. 2022 Natural Gas House Explosion In Dauphin County  [PaEN]

-- PUC PA One Call Damage Prevention Committee Imposes $177,875 In Penalties Against 120 Violators

-- DEP Responds To Oil Spill In Conodoguinet Creek; PA American Water Company Shuts Water Intake, Customers Asked To Conserve Water In Cumberland County  [PaEN]

-- DEP Blog: Attention Home Heating Oil Users - Check Your Tanks To Prevent Costly Leaks, Spills

-- Guest Essay: My Hometown Shows The Benefits Of The Fossil Fuel Industry Come At A Tremendous Cost - Gov. Shapiro, Let's Hold Them Accountable - Support The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative  - By Rev. Mitchell Hescox, Evangelical Environmental Network - Action  [PaEN]

-- Environmental Advocates To Spend More Than $250,000 In Support Of McCaffery In Critical PA Supreme Court Race To Protect Constitutional Right To Clean Air, Pure Water  [PaEN]

NewsClips:

-- Inside Climate News - Jon Hurdle: Research By Public Health Experts Shows ‘Damning’ Evidence Of Harms From Natural Gas Development; Industry Rejected The Reports As ‘Junk Science’

-- Spotlight PA: Potter County Township Wants To Make It Easier For Other Places In PA To Fight Oil/Gas Wastewater Injection Wells

-- Inside Climate News: Answers About Old Conventional Gas Wells Repurposed As Injection Wells For Oil/Gas Wastewater May Never Be Fully Unearthed

-- Energy News Network: Ohio Oil & Gas Industry Spills, Releases Boost Worries About Drilling Under State Parks

-- Hilco Redevelopment Breaks Ground For Bellwether District In South Philadelphia On Former Philadelphia Energy Solutions Refinery Site

-- WHYY/BillyPenn: What To Know About The Bellwether District, The Giant Complex Now Rising On The Site Of The Former Philadelphia Refinery

-- Courier Times: Nooses And Slurs vs. Contested Firing: PA Workplace Discrimination Cases Yield Very Different Outcomes; Case Of Oil & Gas Employee vs. Starbucks Manager

-- Pittsburgh Business Times: Mountain Valley Natural Gas Pipeline’s Costs Rise Again As Timeline Extends

-- Inside Climate News: Federal Pipeline & Hazardous Materials Safety Administration Begins Regulating 400,000 Miles Of Natural Gas Gathering Pipelines, Industry Isn’t Happy  [8.6 to 16 inches]

-- Utility Dive: PJM Interconnection Asks FERC To Approve Capacity Market Reforms In Push To Bolster Grid Reliability After Winter Storm Elliot

-- Utility Dive: Investments In PJM-Area Natural Gas And Traditional Power Plants Hurt Private Equity Funds’ Performance Due To Nonperformance Penalties From Winter Storm Elliot

-- Williamsport Sun: Lycoming College Clean Water Institute’s Matt Kaunert Speaks About Declining Populations Of Hellbenders In Pennsylvania

[Posted: October 19, 2023]

10/23/2023