Frack Caution

To start off I'm going to explain some of the fracking process, and then I'm going to discuss some issues that result from fracking that isn't widely covered in the media.

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is the process of drilling down and horizontally underground and pumping massive amounts of water (up to millions of gallons per well!), proppant (sand and other debris), and chemical cocktail under extreme pressure to break up rock in order to release natural gas or oil to be captured for fuel. This method is supposed to be cleaner than coal because when burned it releases only half of the greenhouse gases (GHGs), and thus is considered a potential "transition" fuel towards alternative energy.

The process pumps down massive amounts of water that then comes back up as contaminated flowback or produced water. This water is then supposed to be stored at the drill site in tanks or in a pit dug into the ground until it can be either brought to a waste water treatment plant, like a local municipality, or is injected into an underground well. So it's supposed to be treated at a plant and then put back into surface water like a river or just pumped back into the ground, away from drinking sources, and left for good.

This seems almost all fine and dandy and is what you can find out by reading the EPA's website. (The EPA is known for having a rocky reputation, from who is running it to what they have allowed the oil industry to get away, with making the public question its integrity.)

What they don't tell you...

According to Butler in "The Energy Reader" if you look at the overall process of fracking there are many points at which methane gas, which is released from the rock, escapes and is lost into the atmosphere at many points. This released methane gas is a GHG that is 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide, so the life-cycle analysis of fracking would conclude that natural gas is not better than coal in terms of environmental impact.

Methane is a greenhouse gas that is 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.

What I found disturbing are the suspected pollution of groundwater and health impacts on the communities surrounding fracking wells. The flowback water contains proppant debris and the chemical cocktail it was pumped with, but it also includes other substances that were also released from the rock. The rock used to be ocean bedrock and releases super concentrated ocean brine, benzene, heavy metals, and radioactive materials that then flows back up the hole and to the surface with flowback. There is already a huge issue with what to do with nuclear radioactive waste because it will last thousands of years and we're running out of safe storage for it. Now we're pushing another largescale practice that also results in radioactive waste? What are we going to do with it?

And that chemical cocktail I keep mentioning? There's a reason why I haven't listed what's in it, because it hasn't been released to the public. Apparently, the oil industry claims proprietary rights over the chemical mixture they use during fracking and thus refuses to release that information to the public or environmental agencies.

Now they claim that the industry disposes of this used water properly, but that can't be right because the technology to transform this water back to drinkable water doesn't exist. Locally, there is huge potential for a mistake to be made and for them to contaminate drinking water, in which case responders and health professionals wouldn't know what they were dealing with. On a broader scale, if you know anything about how the water table works (of which I know the basics from speaking with an expert at my hometown meeting over another issue) then you know that water that is put into the ground doesn't just stay there. The water gets filtered through the layers of soil and gradually moves toward water bodies until it releases back into a river and the ocean; it's a constant slow filtering process that's part of the water cycle. Injecting super concentrated and contaminated water into our ground doesn't seem like the brightest idea when the world already has a shortage of clean drinking water; and that's their proper disposal method.

The technology to transform this water back to drinkable water doesn't exist.

During Earth week earlier this year I went to a presentation by Yuri Gorby, an RPI professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering, on his research with fracking communities in this country. A lot of information stayed with me from his presentation, including the fact that the fracking sites aren't well monitored or regulated. That or the drivers are being told break their practices by driving down an empty rural road and DUMPING the flowback water as they go. Professor Gorby described instances where he could follow the runoff stream of flowback water that ran from a fracking site right down the road to a local farm! What seemed to be another common practice was something called "flairing" which is the practice of lighting the gas and contaminants escaping the well om fire and just letting it burn. When this occurs for hours on end he described how you would step outside and taste the chemicals in your mouth. Many, if not most, of the residents in these fracking communities had recently come down with many of the same symptoms having to do with the water and air quality. It was so bad that families actually filled the cracks in their homes like people in during the Dust Bowl had to in order to keep the chemical filled air out. That is, if they didn't move out of town altogether. And try selling your house for a reasonable price or at all when buyers in the area know of the problems; the value of these people's homes have decreased because it's so bad.

Sound familiar? If you watch the mainstream media it wouldn't be. Only within the past couple of weeks has a Yale study been published in Environmental Health Perspectives (a journal of the National Institutes of Health) reporting that people living closer to fracking wells report more health symptoms than those living farther away. This is finally starting to raise awareness over the suffering of these communities and also raise public concern over the potential human exposure to chemicals and toxins created by fracking practices.

Yale study shows people living closer to fracking wells report more health symptoms than those living farther away.

This is why there are communities that are trying to ban fracking in their area, across the country, and around the world. Germany is in a position where they would seem to benefit from fracking because they have the resources, their infrastructure is very well set up for it, they are in need of more domestic energy production, and they want to stop relying so heavily on Russia. With all that in mind, it's a pretty big deal that Germany has a 7-year ban on fracking, either because their government decided to listen to the public outcry over it, or they were honest when they said they don't know enough about the risks involved and are proceeding with caution. This is called the 'Precautionary Principle', where if people and the government feel that the science hasn't provided enough information or knowledge to prove something is safe then they won't go ahead with it until they do. What a concept huh?

The US largely ignores precaution and takes action based on 'risk management'. In this case, if the US chooses to continue to ignore problems with fracking, then it sends the message that the US says 'frack' caution. Hopefully, with more reports published on the negative effects of fracking and the banning of fracking spreading, more countries including the US will look around with constructive criticism and move forward with caution.

Word Count: 1,283

Sources:

• Butler, T. (2012). The Energy Reader: Overdevelopment and the Delsuion of Endless Growth. (T. Butler, D. Lerch, & G. Wuerthner, Eds.) (p. 121, 175-178). Canada: Foundation for Deep Ecology, Post Carbon Institute, Watershed Media.
• Germany Bans Fracking. (2014, July 8). Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://online.wsj.com/articles/germany-bans-fracking-1404763231
• US EPA, OA, OEAEE, O. (2014). The Process of Hydraulic Fracturing. Retrieved September 19, 2014, from http://www2.epa.gov/hydraulicfracturing/process-hydraulic-fracturing
• Zeltner, B. (2014, September 10). Residents living nearer natural gas wells report more health symptoms, Yale study says. Cleaveland.com. Retrieved from http://www.cleveland.com/healthfit/index.ssf/2014/09/residents_living_nearer_natura.html#incart_river