At a one-day meeting of California’s state legislature Monday a new bill was introduced calling for public disclosure of chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in oil/natural gas drilling by the same state lawmaker who has unsuccessfully sponsored similar bills the past two years.

The new bill will be taken up when the legislature starts its new session Jan. 7.

Assembly member Bob Wieckowski, a Democrat from the East San Francisco Bay Area town of Fremont, CA, acknowledged that his bill (AB 7) parallels ongoing efforts in the state oil/gas agency to draft fracking regulations (see Shale Daily, Nov. 30). Companies would be required to disclose a complete list of names, chemical numbers and maximum concentrations for each chemical used in fracking.

Contending that California has done “a poor job” of collecting the chemical information about which the public is “demanding answers,” Wieckowski said “the public has a right to know the type of chemicals that are being pumped underground in case there is a leak or contamination.”

AB 7 would establish six disclosure points:

A spokesperson for Wieckowski told NGI’s Shale Daily that AB 7 is similar to last year’s failed measure (AB 51), “but we expect to make changes to it once we see what is in or missing from the regulations put forth by DOGGR.”

Last year the Wieckowski bill was held in the Senate Appropriations Committee, the spokesperson said. However, “the controversy surrounding the lack of [fracking] information” helped push DOGGR to begin drafting regulations this fall. “I intend to craft this legislation to work in conjunction with DOGGR’s regulations,” Wieckowski said. “Californians deserve a disclosure bill on fracking that is worthy of our state’s strong history of environmental protection.”