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The Consequences Of Fracking: Two Clashing Views
Submitted by Andy Tully via OilPrice.com,
Two academic studies of the health dangers of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, have produced different conclusions.
One, conducted by Yale University, said people living near fracking sites report increased health problems. The other, by Penn State University, says fracking water stays underground, far below the groundwater supplies that people use for drinking, and poses no threat.
Both studies were conducted in Pennsylvania, part of the Marcellus Shale formation in the sprawling Appalachian Basin in the eastern United States. It holds enormous reserves of gas and has been a focus of fracking activity and protests.
In the Yale study, former Yale medical professor Dr. Peter Rabinowitz reported in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives that residents living near a fracking site in southwestern Pennsylvania were more than twice as likely to report skin problems and respiratory illnesses than those living farther away.
Rabinowitz, now at Pennsylvania’s University of Washington, surveyed 492 people in 180 households in Washington County, PA -- the heart of the Marcellus Shale. Thirty-nine percent of respondents living within 0.6 of a mile of a gas well reported sinus infections and nosebleeds, compared with 18 percent who said the same and lived more than twice as far away.
The difference was even starker for those reporting skin problems: Thirteen percent reported rashes, while only 3 percent of people who lived farther away had the same complaints.
Rabinowitz said his is “the largest study to date” of its kind. But he cautioned that he isn’t directly linking fracking to the health problems. To determine that will require more research, he said, because “it’s more of an association than a causation.”
The Penn State study concluded that the water and chemicals that are injected into deep shale to help extract gas stays far below the surface and therefore doesn’t pose a serious threat to drinking water supplies.
The study, whose results were published in the Journal of Unconventional Oil and Gas Resources, was conducted by Terry Engelder, professor of geosciences at Penn State; Lawrence Cathles, professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at Cornell University; and Taras Bryndzia, a geologist at Shell International Exploration and Production, Inc.
Opponents of fracking say the contaminated water used to help extract the gas could seep toward the surface and foul clean groundwater. The Penn State study says this isn’t likely because the water would seep up too slowly, if it seeped at all.
Further, it says, upward migration of tainted water isn’t plausible because of the forces used to inject the water into the shale. “As water is wicked into gas shale, the natural gas in the shale is pushed out, Engelder says. “The capillary forces that suck the [water] into the gas shale keep it there.”
The debate continues.
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i wonder who's getting money from special interests...
it comes down to CASH!>>>
bitchez!
They both are.
One from oil & gas, one from the environmental religious lobby.
They're both special interests, and neither has YOUR best interests at heart. One wants to maximize profits at your expense, and the other wants to control your behavior and send you back to the stone age for their beliefs.
Doesn't really matter, both are likely to be reset back to near-zero from the coming Crunch. Or if we are lucky, the coming de-centralization will remove power from both of them. Just realize that nearly all research is performed by someone who is being supported (financed) by SOMEONE, whether it's an industry, a government agency or nebulous groups who hide behind innocuous-sounding names.
Do your own research, and if you can't afford to frack your own formation to test, then automatically be suspicious of EVERYONE!
The debate continues.
Lol, yes, another great debate! Just like tobacco.. harmful, not harmful? WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND BOTH SIDES
In its continued devotion to important debate, penn state will next investigate whether drinking drano causes adverse side affects. Thank gawd we'll finally have BOTH SIDES, my money is on NO adverse affects, dont fail me penn!http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-03/penn-state-faculty-snub-of-frac...
2012 ^
BOTH SIDES
"One from oil & gas, one from the environmental religious lobby."
I don't see why you despise the environmentalist and why so many seemingly share your opinion. Is it because environmentalists want to impose restriction on the market and society in general? If so, it is time to grow up and acknowledge that there has to be rules and regulations in a society.
I looked up the two journals these studies were published in. A quick look will give you an idea about which one has possible vested interests:
Here is the editorial board for the Yale journal, where the study based on a survey about health problems around fracking sites was published:
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/editorial-board/
And here is the editorial board for the Penn journal, where the study whose conclusions were based on models and assumptions about fracking fluids was published:
http://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-unconventional-oil-and-gas-r...
Really? OK, I'll try:
Being an "environmentalist" means property rights, liberty and safety of individuals is negotiable, and that the individuals involved are not included in the negotiations. The EPA can declare any body of water or "wet land", even if only wet part of the year or every couple of years, to be wetlands. That simple declaration, only contestable in expensive court proceedings, makes your land public land. From that moment, you cannot build anything, modify anything, change anything without their permission (and good luck getting it).
Here's how the scam works: Joey Blow from the local Tree-hugger society decides your land would make a great park, or reserve for the greater-spotted penguin, none of which has ever been seen there. He "sues" the EPA for not having already declared your land a park or reserve; the EPA screams "uncle" and as part of a settlement of Joey's lawsuit, declares your land is now a park. Often, the EPA advises novice "environmental groups" on how and when to "sue" the EPA to make this happen; since it actually increases the effect and authority of the EPA to run people off their land, they don't really mind being "sued" in the least.
You now have to countersue, and retain expensive lawyers, to show that this was all a fraud, that Joey Blow just wanted to get you off your land because he owes you money, lost your car or whatever, and the government has to admit that they were led down a garden path by a charlatan who was simply jealous of your success. How often do you think this happens?
This goes up to the highest levels of government; Slick Willie Clinton declared a whole lot of land in Utah to be the "Grand Staircase/Escalante National Monument" during his tenure. Why? Beneath it is a whole lot of low-sulfur hard anthracite coal, which his chief campaign contributor the Riady / Lippo family of Indonesia considered a threat to their coal interests. So to pay them off, he removed a possible competitor before another company could develop it. If that harridan he married gets in, God save us all! The scandals will run 24 / 7!
Environmentalists seem to feel that government force is a sufficient counter to any amount of logic, law or reason; all that is necessary is for one fringe group or another to make a claim, and the agency responsible for protecting the environment will seize, sanction or restrict any property they want to, without compensation or regard for reality. The rule of law has become the rule of lawyers, and regulators without accountability have shredded the Constitution. You cannot be imprisoned without due process? You can be imprisoned now for as long as it takes them to notice (or your lawyer to file habeas corpus) unless they call you a "terrorist", in which case all bets are off and new rules apply (think Guantanamo Bay). If you really think that "there has to be rules and regulations in a society" you are much mistaken, since you're living in one without any but the Rule of Obama; whatever Obama wants, he writes an Executive Order for, and gets (due to a gutless Congress).
I don't despise environmentalists in total; national parks from the Teddy Roosevelt admin were a good idea. Now, however, Agenda 21 from the UN is being implemented by stealth, and we can all swelter in cities so that "environmentalists" can feel good about themselves. Inasmuch as their actions hasten the Crunch and they can all starve, I actually approve; should they succeed in penning all humanity in endless concrete cities without greenbelts or sustaining farmland, the resulting death wave will be on their heads, whether or not they remain attached to their bodies. Buy a farm, GeorgeWKush, and try putting in a stock pond to water your cattle, or a fish pond, or any other change to the flow of water, and see what environmentalism is really like. Then try selling your investment (if you can stay out of jail) and see what your love of the land has brought you.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/724170/posts
http://www.nationalcenter.org/VictimDirectory98.html
http://epaabuse.com/16837/editorials/exposed-epas-phony-environmental-ju...
The EPA has become a blunt club used to beat landowning citizens over the head with regulations in order to steal their land. Believe otherwise at your peril.
These two reports are not contradictory.
It's possible for the fracked fluid that stays down to not be a problem*, while the blowback that is collected in an open air pond and volatilizes and drifts to be inhaled/absorbed by unlucky downwinders causes large scale health problems.
Both can be true, and in my view both are true.*
*Assumption: the fracked rock is capped by a continuous and unfaulted and unbroken layer or layers and the wells are sealed properly with cement and then plugged post-abandonment.
*Assumption: the fracked rock is capped by a continuous and unfaulted and unbroken layer or layers and the wells are sealed properly with cement and then plugged post-abandonment.
Could be said about a lot of things, 'if cigarette smoking didn't cause cancer, it wouldn't be as harmful.."
Everyone knows the wells leak.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jun/20/fracking-wells-pennsy...
^ zhers won't like this study because it refers to the great satan (agw) but they tested wells and guess what, all of them were leaking
... tested wells and all of them were leaking ... That statement, and any " study " claiming same, display such a stunning level of ridiculousness and provable falsehood, that it should not - could not - be taken with a shred of seriousness.
... tested wells and all of them were leaking ...
Yes - of the wells they tested, 100% were leaking. Not everything i write here is proper english, go to the link.
Penn Fucking State huh! Kid fucker U is close to the Harrisburg cesspool and the frack loving Governor is on the board of trustees. Fuck anything that comes from that fucking hole.
FRACKING IS
i) AWFUL FOR THE GROUNDWATER/SOIL,
ii) AN INEFFICIENT WAY TO EXTRACT OIL,
iii) ONLY REALLY CREATES REAL WEALTH THROUGH PROFITS FOR THE OWNERS OF THE MACHINES AND COMPANIES WHO FRACK, AND
iv) THERE ARE WAYS IN WHICH WE CAN ALL CREATE OUR OWN VIABLE ALTERNATIVE ENERGY FOR OURSELVES.
I'm sorry for all the yelling, but instead of spending billions of dollars trying to get more polluting oil from the ground, or instead of spending billions of dollars trying to figure out what dark matter is by smashing particles together,
PERHAPS we could all look into, or invest our time and not that much money, relatively speaking (a few hundred million at most) into low energy nuclear reactions. Has not anyone heard the buzz? This stuff is real. Over 20 independent labs from around the world have produced results with their, for lack of a better term, cold fusion experiments. The stuff is promising folks, and it's here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTvaX3vRtRA
There are plenty of sites around the net buzzing about this stuff. Look it up.
Check out the guys at MIT who have recently claimed that we will, in due time and with adequate funding be able to mass manufacture a device that each person could have in their own home: http://coldfusionnow.org/commercial-developments-presented-at-2014-mit-c...
Imagine that: energy soveriegnty.
Curious, eh?
What would money, or the concept of having a job, become if that ever happened?
Oh wait, I know: largely irrelevant
No wonder either i) no one knows about cold fusion or ii) it will most likely never be actualized into something commercial for all of us
Zero, I disagree 1000% with all your anti-fraccing, anti industrial statements, and I agree wholeheartedly that LENR is coming in the very near future and will be an epochal event.
and I agree wholeheartedly that LENR is coming in the very near future and will be an epochal event
So you have a nicely high skepticism of research with real theoretical backing yet cling with zeal to research with no credible backing?
On second thought I guess that makes sense, there are those who see a direct relationship between evidence and theory and those who cling to an inverse relationship.
Addition:
Fracking is awful for the groundwater and soil.
Look at the evidence... flames from faucets, un-drinkable tap water with many toxic chemicals way beyond their ppm norm, uhhhh what more do you need?
None of this "evidence" has ever held up to honest scrutiny. The methane from the water faucet lie told in Gasland actually came from a water well that was drilled into several layers of COAL. Had nothing to do with hydraulic fracturing.
Fracking does not harm groundwater or the soil. This is nothing but emotional invective, devoid of any real science.
my roomate's sister-in-law makes $72 hourly on the laptop . She has been out of a job for 6 months but last month her payment was $18482 just working on the laptop for a few hours. use this link... www.payvalt.com
"that residents living near a fracking site in southwestern Pennsylvania were more than twice as likely to report skin problems and respiratory illnesses than those living farther away."
Because they work in a coal mine?
No, they be down wind of West Virginia.
You might just catch an STD (Standard Oil Territorial Dispute).
Yes, "no threat" to the professors sitting in their office armchairs drinking triple-distilled, aged 48 y.o. Scottish Highland malt liquor I suspect.
Fracking ops in North Dakota are polluting the Ogallala Aquifer at the top end, there's lots of fracking polluting the Aquifer in the middle, and the failed WIPP facility in New Mexico will soon dump the worst nuclear waste possible into the southern end.
Someone here said the Keystone Pipeline isn't for oil, it's for Canadian water to replace what we're destroying. Not that the fracking and nuclear waste won't leach into the agricultural soil.
One significant byproduct of eliminating the US population is there will be less people to complain about fracking, and the survivors that will be assigned to slave in the fracking deposits will be too sick to bitch.
I would estimate that they're estimating that the last US citizen will drop just as the last fracking rig plays out.
This ridiculous invective says more about you than it does about the subject.
Dupe.
Calm down, can happen, but it "isn’t likely". Life is a lottery.
Yep. And it doesn't pose a "serious" threat to drinking water supplies. Just a moderate threat. We need a color coded chart like the terror alert levels. I guess this is more of a mauve.
The Penn State guys say "frack away--we live outside the danger zone"
I have a friend who lives up near Clarks Summit in PA. Way the hell and gone up the Northeast Extension, almost in New York (NE corner of PA). They do fracking all around him. He started complaining of all sorts of weird symptoms. Fatigue, skin problems, etc.
He swore it was from the chemicals used in fracking.
6 months later he found out it was Lymes Disease. Oops.
Who diagnosed Lyme vs. fracking chemical exposure? Is it something that can be seen in the blood, or just a doctor's opinion?
The constant exposure to all this shit weakens the immune system, and off it goes. Soon there won't be a need for any 'specific' disease diagnosis, there won't be any treatment other than pain pills, so it's all becoming pointless.
Beware of mutants.
If you think energy is expensive, just wait until you see what Devon, Halliburton, et al charge for water. I don't see that this study takes into account the failure rate of casings..(50% over 50 years?) just an observation
but don't take my word for it: http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/files/documents/ingraffea.pdf
It's refreshing to see an article where the author doesn't mistake "fracking" for the entire extraction process.
The first study is probably a piece of shit. Pennsylvania has coal, and that extraction causes a lot of respiratory problems, even it's transport causes a dust issue.
Further, it says, upward migration of tainted water isn’t plausible because of the forces used to inject the water into the shale. “As water is wicked into gas shale, the natural gas in the shale is pushed out, Engelder says. “The capillary forces that suck the [water] into the gas shale keep it there.”
So we're putting fresh water into the ground that isn't coming out for decades? That's the story here, but nobody seems to be paying attention to that.
Yup, just water. That is why its illegal for doctors to disclose fracking chemicals to their patients. Trade secrets allow them not to disclose that its just water, otherwise everyone would be fracking.
This is why nobody likes you. You're a dumbass. You ignore the water angle, you know that stuff that you're mostly made of, in favor of the conspiracy theory.
What are you, a shill for oil & gas? And whats with the "nobody likes you"? What is this, junior high?
The Yale one is a pretty simple survey study, pretty cut & dried, not much room for judgement, which is necessary for the kind of conclusions that come with the modeling & assumptions that the Penn study uses. Particularly when the peer review is done by people with a vested interest in the outcome.
Here is the a little background on the Penn study.
http://www.nofrackingway.us/2014/09/12/frack-water-shell-game-frackademi...
Coal isn't always present where there is Natural Gas, but methane is almost always present where there is coal, and Pennsylvania has a lot of coal. The extraction and transportation of coal creates a lot, and I mean lot of dust and general nastiness. More than enough to cause breathing, and skin problems. The snippet of the study doesn't in anyway address that fact, so no it's not at all cut and dried.
Here is a list of chemicals used in fracking http://fracfocus.org/chemical-use/what-chemicals-are-used , it does not contain "trade secret" chemicals. Here is an article on land fill waste records (not clean fresh water?) https://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2014/09/02/report-drilling-wast... . Here is an article of fracking chemicals ending up in the water supply http://www.newsweek.com/fracking-wells-tainting-drinking-water-texas-and...
The list of fracking chemicals does not contain "trade secret" chemicals because this "secret chemicals" business is a figment of your imagination. The E&Ps are required by various regulatory agencies (mostly state government entities) to report these things.
A frack job uses a slurry consisting of 90% water, 9.5% sand or other proppant, and 0.5% other chemicals, mostly harmless industrial and/or household agents used to curtail bacterial growth in the well casing. Guar gum is one of the most common. This is also found in ice cream.
But even if the chemicals were harmful, and they are not, they still will not make their way from 6,000+ feet below the surface to <300 feet below by "seeping" or leaking through the 5-layer concrete/steel casing and into the water supply. Don't you think the Operator that completed the well would make damn sure that these failures were made virtually impossible, so as to maximize the return on the well?
And citing that tabloid Newsweek as a source is outright embarrassing.
"The “gag rule” stems from a section of Act 13, which requires nondisclosure agreements from healthcare providers who seek information on chemical exposures, which may be deemed “confidential” by industry. The law, which was drafted without the knowledge or consultation of healthcare providers, forces doctors to sign a nondisclosure agreement, thereby agreeing not to share any ingredients in the industry’s secret sauce used to frack and drill for natural gas." https://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2014/07/17/commonwealth-court-t...
Here is something that may fit your view, but you can discount it because it it from another horrible tabloid http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/09/15/leaky-gas-wells-not-frack...
The original point being it's not "clean". I think the rush to frack by claming it is absolutley clean caused more damage than having a discussion on how clean.
The personal attacks on this site are getting pretty lame. (Your stupid and nobody likes you, you cite dumb stuff).
Whether or not a medical doctor may release exposure information for a patient is completely immaterial. I'd suspect Hipa-a covers that. But who cares?
If you want to know what a particular E&P is using for their not-so-secret sauce, you can find this from the appropriate state regulatory agency covering the area - if not from the E&P's website itself! Should I Google that for you?
What part of this is difficult for you to understand? The ingredients of the fracking slurry are not a secret.
What no trade secret? http://ecowatch.com/2014/04/28/fracking-company-reveal-trade-secret-chem... "Baker Hughes, has announced it will be releasing a list of all the chemicals used during fracking. The news of the disclosure is nothing short of groundbreaking, as the chemical mixture used in most fracking operations has been a secret covetously kept by the oil and gas industry for decades." And I Googled it, took 10 seconds. Thanks for the advice. Lets Google their site and take a look at the first MDS I pulled up, http://public.bakerhughes.com/shalegas/collateral/FRW14.pdf . "Can cause central nervous system depression, nausea, dizziness, vomiting or unconsciousness ". Now a frack well takes approx 4 million gallons with 1% (.5-2%), 40K gallons of chemicals. With the bad casing article that I cited from earlier. You stated that was virtually impossible, looks like it happens alot more than you think. Yes its unclean. That's the point. Not, we shouldn't frack.
Now he's quoting ecowatch.com. Good grief.
It's "MSDS," not "MDS." Also, "a lot" is two words, not one.
And that MSDS is for an alcohol-based surface-tension modifier that enhances the ablity of the slurry to evenly distribute proppant particles in the shale fractures. The blurb about what happens when you ingest it is common if you're accustomed to reading MSDSs: if you drink it straight, it will make you sick. Duh.
Even if the tiny amount of chemicals contained in the slurry were more harmful to a human than, say, rubbing alcohol (see above), you still have to find some way to modify the laws of physics so that the slurry can penetrate 6,000 feet of dense rock to make it up into the water aquifer. "Seepage" through wellbore casings would cause this if it ever did happen; but I challenge you to find one credible report to that effect that the EPA has investigated and determined to be legit.
Turn off the Matt Damon and Rick Fox movies. Try this:
http://energyindepth.org/just-the-facts/
Thank you for actually posting something, I have read and posted industry and state sites also. Here is a study on seepage http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/09/15/leaky-gas-wells-not-frack... .
"Instead, by tracing precisely how methane migrated from 133 well sites in 2012 and 2013, Darrah and fellow researchers from Duke, Stanford, Dartmouth and the University of Rochester found that the gas escaped as it traveled up through the vertical pipes, leaking through the cement casing and into the aquifer.
"These results appear to rule out the migration of methane up into drinking water aquifers from depth because of horizontal drilling or hydraulic fracturing, as some people feared," researcher Avner Vengosh, a professor of geochemistry and water quality at Duke, said in a statement.
Darrah called the findings “good news.”"
“It means that most of the issues we have identified can potentially be avoided by future improvements in well integrity,” he said.
It was posted earlier in the thread, it states that there problems in some casing that can be corrected. Here is the abstract http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/09/12/1322107111.abstract?sid=d8d... .Taking a polarizing red/blue mentality position of there is nothing wrong eliminates any chance at a reasonable discussion. Problems with the casing and chemicals, fix them, don't pretend they don't exist. Will there be more issues with drilling through different substrates and chemicals, yes. Acknowledge and move to address and fix those issues.
I'm not impressed with your fetish for posting links to myriad sites, which appears to be a sophomoric effort to build credibility for yourself. I've been around plenty of half-wits whose only recourse in an argument is the irrational appeal to authority. This is mild form of sociopathy. Whenever someone asks, "Oh yeah, what's your source?," or "Link please!!!???," it's a pretty sure sign that person doesn't know what the hell he's talking about, but has a strong opinion anyway. Because Rachael Maddow told him so, I guess.
As a rule, I don't attach links very often. I figure I'm as good a source of information as anyone to whom I might link regarding the two or three subjects I consider myself learned enough to comment on. This happens to be one of those subjects.
At no point have you made an attempt to engage in any actual debate with me. You seem completely unaware that you have capitulated on several points, and simply dropped others.
So now you've found another article from yet another tabloid rag, US News and World Report, which was not, as you described, a "study on seepage." But anyway, it should come as no real surprise that some of these older well casings put in the ground decades before the modern advances in the technology have had some isolated problems. Of the 1.2 million frack wells drilled since 1947, they could only find 133 in two of the biggest fracking-boom states. I'd call that a success story. These isolated cases are not demonstrative of a larger problem. The Operators have a vested interest in ensuring these precious hydrocarbons do not leak out, but are recovered and sold for profit.
Wrong on most counts about me, looks fun though. You have the arrogance that will make you a senior VP if you can keep the fact that you are a self absorbed idiot from everyone. Anything you don't understand can be shouted down with a religious zeal. Why read? You know it already. Coworkers label you an asshat. You are so full of yourself didn't even bother to scan an article that stated that fracking isn't a problem and that it is safe (even after I posted it 3 times). The issue lies with casings that can be improved to make it safer eliminating much of the problems with fracking. Good lord debate what? They were testing water wells, you didn't even get that right. Thanks for playing.
I never said you shouldn't frack, but the whole its clean and we inject the earth with candy and beer and rainbows come out is bullshit.
So, from "secret fracking fluids," to some nonsense about how medical doctors are shockingly bound to confidentiality regarding their patients, to not knowing what an MSDS is or how to read one, to "seepage studies" that aren't, and now you've finally diagnosed me with the psychological disorder of being an asshat.
You need to go back and re-read that last article, which YOU have obviously read without understanding.
You're a piece of work, dude. I'm done here.
Honest to fucking God you conspiracy theorists are annoying. Lets put aside for a moment that congress created a moronic law, since that shouldn't be that surprising. What you're asking us to believe is that there is a conspiracy to prevent the average doctor from divulging the secret chemicals used in fracing fluid that he reverse engineered from patient samples with only limited access to lab equipment like chromatographs. Why couldn't I just get the ground water tested? Why do I need to go to all that extra trouble fucking with a doctor?
You seem knowledgeable about how this actually works, so I have a question about water usage. How many cubic ft. of gas is, generally, produced with 1 gallon of fracing fluid?
That water is coming out, and it isn't taking decades. And no, it never gets any cleaner than when it went in. Those chemicals don't get filtered out by sub-strata.
Not according to the study. It says that the water is wicked into the rock and not released. That means that a nation gripped by an epic drought is pouring water down a hole never to be recovered.
See all sides are serial liars, especially money-seeking scientists, I'm quite willing to go back to grandma reading chicken bones.
Hear, hear! +100
All "sides" may be serial liars but there is a winning side that is backed by our technocratic central bankers and government. What side do you think they are on? I'm betting that they are on the side of drill, baby drill and not on the side of what is in the best interest of individuals who may be harmed in the maintaining of their status quo of infinite growth. I think the status quo of "infinite growth" has been replaced with the status quo of "recovery" but it doesn't matter -- SSDD.
Turtle shells, for the win! Oh, wait, . . . takes too many turtles.
Save the turtles!!!
Why is Yale conducting health questionnaires of folks who drink groundwater in fracking-intense areas to find out if the water is affected? Can't they just test the groundwater for contamination up front?
What is this approach, "We have to drink it to find out what's in it"?
Our government is in the process of negotiating to ship the radioactive Fukushima waste water to North America for use in fracking
No, it's easier to just let it run into the Pacific Ocean and kill off all sea life. Right around 99% at this point.
Now, Canadian water. There's some pristine water just waitin' to be contaminated forever.
And just as I suspected, the main power plant at Yale that produces electricity and heat for the campus -- runs on 'natty gas'! So like many liberals -- it is fine if WE get to USE fossil fuels, but WE sure don't want ANYONE to actually PRODUCE them!
http://sustainability.yale.edu/planning-progress/areas-focus/energy/ener...
The Sierra Club has been suing major universities and getting them to shut down their coal plants.
Sierra Club is also a large donor to ICLEI, the 'implementation arm' of UN Agenda 21... go figure on that one eh?
Regarding Penn State, Wendy Lee wrote in 2012:
"it’s the story of a university beholden to an industry that has come to dictate key aspects of the university’s mission. Penn State has effectively forfeited its responsibility to act as an independent agent for the public good, and uses the professorial status of one of its celebrity own—Terry Engelder—to legitimate it. Engelder’s “letter to Colleagues” makes marketing look like education—great for Penn State, Inc. Professor Engelder is beholden not to Penn State (other than to legitimate his status), but to those corporations who fund his research into the Marcellus Shale, who fund his graduate student’s future careers, who donate enormous sums to his university—and to his place in history.
...
In other words, Engelder knows that his appeal as a university academic offers the best possible propaganda to the industry and, as a bonus, offers cover to a state government—the Corbett administration—that’s as deeply compromised by fracking dollars as are its appointments to key agencies and positions hail from Big Energy."
http://www.ragingchickenpress.org/2012/02/15/the-unholy-alliance-of-big-...
Thanks for that spooz. Our "Institutions" are filthy from top to bottom. A daunting task awaits our young'uns with still functioning cerebral cortexes.
this shit isn't fucking rocket science. when you fracture deep underground formations with the intention of getting things out, don't be shocked when things happen. oh, they say it's just methane gas... which is still bad, and it's migrating due to the disturbances caused by drilling. then yes, there IS seepage, and ALL WELLS eventually leak, but most leak within 10 years.
If you look at the extraction costs, the capping costs, the net "gain" from what comes out... it's definitely profitable. However, once you start getting into the cleanup costs and the recapping costs, and the compensation to those adversely impacted, it's a net loss. That's why the big companies love selling off the borderline wells to small companies. The small companies come in without having to drill, they just frack it and see 1 or 2 years of profit before it's dead for all intents and purposes. They'll let it keep flowing for another few years until the upkeep exceeds the output, then "cap" it off or sell it on to some other sucker who thinks they might be able to refrack it and squeeze out some more. Regardless, down the line it goes, eating up dumb money investors until it ends up in the hands of a sucker who gets stuck with the liabilities of the leaking well, but no ability to pay for it to be cleaned up... oops, bankrupt, no one is liable anymore except for the taxpayers when it becomes a superfund site.
The problem is that these wells DO NOT leak as you advertise. They DO NOT require decades of cleanup activities after the wellhead has depleted and is no longer profitable. In the US, we have hydraulically fractured over a million wells since 1947 - bloody Truman was in office - and there is no evidence to support your argument.
Hey thing that can fly, I think you are wasting your time trying to sway individuals who already have their mind made up, primarily based on emotive, ideological grounds rather than facts, rationality, and history.
A fractured well go something like this...five to ten thousand feet below ground, - in a productive area - lies highly pressurized hydrocarbons usually having been there for tens of millions of years. The fracturing process opens up or creates fissures approximately 1/32 of an inch wide. The proppant -usually frac sand -will be transported into these cracks and stay there, thus enabling the hydrocarbons either gas or oil to flow to the wellbore. Whereas early fracturing processes try to create fissures about six to eight hundred feet away from the wellbore, current practice shows the efficacy of fissures opened only a few hundred feet away. All of this occurs thousands of feet below any type of water table.
Don't count on a lot of shale oil flowing to the wellbore, pal.
https://www.dmr.nd.gov/oilgas/stats/historicalbakkenoilstats.pdf
Look at this table and you'll see that the 8000 shale oil 'wells' in the Bakken Formation average about 140 bbls per day.
If you think that's weak, read up on how they get oil from oil shale (different than shale oil).
It makes 140 bbls a day look like Ghawar.
Dupe.
If coal mining can turn your tap water BLACK/BROWN I reckon fracking can do likewise. Without potable water ya'all FUCKED.
But Obongo doesn't care. MOAR Immigrants, MOAR fracking.
This used to be the best place on earth now it is becoming a melange of China, Philippines, Africa, Mexico and Guatemala, and etc.
The US is worth nothing more than the resources that can be extracted. Food will come from South America, the US will be fracked to death, with everyone in it. The wealthy are already set up in South America, a quick private jet flight away.
You reckon incorrectly. Fracking doesn't harm drinking water.
And if you think the eco-Nazi Democrats who write Obama's speeches for him want MOAR fracking, you're completely out of touch with reality.
Dupe.
http://dailycaller.com/2014/09/15/emails-epa-rules-part-of-the-progressi...
One study explains why it can't happen and the other is describing what happens when what couldn't happen, happens. Serfs Up Pensylvannia! SERFS UP AMERICA!! WE'RE NEXT!!!
One study explains why it can't happen and the other is describing what happens when what couldn't happen, happens. Serfs Up Pensylvannia! SERFS UP AMERICA!! YOU'RE NEXT!!!
So the water that is wicked into the space left by the gas stays there, even though the gas keeps on trucking all the way to the surface?
Yes. It has to do with differentials in surface tension.
Why are all my posts getting duped tonight?
ZH Maintenance Mode to the rescue!
Maybe there will be some sweet unintended consequences if you replace shale gas with water in shale formations.
Gotta look on the bright side!
Opponents of shale, offshore, unconventional, whatever, once they realize that the ONLY reason any of these plays exist is because the better stuff is gone, should then recognize that their arguments were never enough to stop coal mines or conventional oil wells, and will never be enough to stop any kind of fossil fuel extraction until and unless demand falls.
There are not many things people will not do in order to acquire a few more joules ... didn't the Atlantic slave trade, nevermind the MidEast slave trade, nevermind the Roman slave trade, prove that beyond all doubt?
I believe our "Academics" are full of shit. They lie articulately for a paycheck. Their credibility is totally fracked. The higher up you go, the more fucking fracked they are. Then you arrive at Janet Napolitano.
Humans, created by their gods in the image of their gods, watched over by their gods, have polluted the entire planet, including the atmosphere, the seas from polar to pole, all the rivers, all the lakes, and the land - why not also the subsurface water, to make the achievement complete ?
Great! It's safe! But is it positive cash flow?
It seems to me that the question is one of exploitation. Sure, it might be cheaper to exploit Chinese workers, but in terms of the energy expended in transportation and importation, is it really cheaper to import manufactured goods from China? When the raw materials, capital equipment, and labor are all here? From an engineering standpoint the answer would seem to be No.
So what is the real deal about fracking? Is it that it's a truly cheaper way to extract petrochemicals, or is the mania due to "market forces" that dictate that pumping millions of gallons of water and chemicals into the ground to get the Earth to fart is cheaper in monetary, rather than physical, terms?
I don't have an answer. but the increasingly frantic, hysterical, and desperate moves by our "leaders" make me think that fracking might be a big mistake.
Had to forgo the possible purchase of 3 houses. Two were older that had good wells until the fracking started in their area. I was excited about one, perfect location near a stream, just needed to be gutted and redone and that was possible at the price. Then the realtor had to come clean that the water had so much gas in it now that you did not even want to shower in it. The leak into the water was not from the transit lines as the house was a a lower elevation than the surface sites of the gas operations.
The third house was newer and at a very good price. Did a google earth look and noted that fracking wells were being started and the owner was bugging out before potential problems. Seems even at the lower price point no one was making offers.
Once the water is contaminated simply stopping the drilling is too late. Those areas are trashed, maybe permanently.
I've looked with google earth at the areas around a few of the water reservoirs. I did not find any fracking. I cannot confirm but was told there was a backroom deal (or threat) that prevented the industry from drilling anywhere close to a major reservoir. I would like to see an independent company start drilling close to those reservoirs and see if the politicians changed their tune. Any examples of fracking near key reservoirs in the strata of New Mexico, Colorado or Wyoming.
Yes there are thousands of fracked wells near major resevoirs. They are all around Pathfinder resevoir ( and probably all resevoirs ) in Wyoming. Also, the EPA ruled that fracking wells in Pavillion Wyoming polluted the local water wells. Wyoming sued the EPA for conducting a faulty study and won.
We can frack you now or we can frack you later, but you are going to get fracked.
Just a note, fracking occurs thousands of feet or even miles underground. That's far lower in the earth than we bury fucking nuclear waste, and you won't see a single headline about how leaking nuclear waste from underground is killing people and the product of fracking is simply methane and propane.
This whole debate is a load of bullshit
We don't shoot up fluids loaded with waste to the surface after we bury the nuclear toxins, and burying them doesn't release huge quantities of methane. Next theory, genius?
http://energyblog.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/04/fracking-water-its-j...
So the second article essentially proposes a model explaining why what the first study observed in people is impossible. As we all know, the model must be right and reality wrong (just like AGW).
http://thoughtmaybe.com/topic/fracking/
lots of films for free about fracking...
wonder how lying scientists want to explain all of this sh*t.
"great" about fracking: you have to buy water and medicine and go away etcetc