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Natural Gas No Quick Fix for U.S. Energy Woes
Food & Water Watch Report Points to Need for Better Federal Regulations; Activists in Delaware River Basin, Colorado and Virginia Fear Risks from Fracking
Washington, D.C.-In the wake of April's calamitous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, pundits are pointing to natural gas as the resource to save the U.S. from its energy woes. But a new report released today by the national consumer advocacy group Food & Water Watch suggests that relying on this polluting technology may simply set the nation up for further ecological disasters.
Not so Fast, Natural Gas: Why Accelerating Risky Drilling
Threatens America's Water outlines the ways in which the rapid
expansion of the oil and gas industry's use of hydraulic fracturing
(also known as "fracking") in recent years compromises essential
drinking water resources, human health and the environment.
The process of extracting gas from rock formations, fracking relies on a chemical cocktail that can be toxic if leaked into groundwater supplies. The industry is not required by federal law to report the type or quantity of chemicals it uses, and only ten states require disclosure of this information. Analysis of what industry information is available reveals that many of the chemicals used in the process can be harmful to human gastrointestinal, respiratory, and nervous systems, especially if leaked into drinking water supplies.
"Much in the same way that April's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico caused many to question the risks posed by shore oil drilling, hydraulic fracturing poses a profound risk to our nation's drinking water," said Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter. "Unlike oil drilling however, it doesn't take a single blowout to create an environmental catastrophe. The dangers of fracking are slow, yet insidious."
Waste generated by the process is also an environmental hazard, especially because it is often injected underground or sent to wastewater facilities that often lack the resources to effectively treat it. In addition to polluting local water, hydraulic fracturing can also be responsible for its depletion. The process can use up to 3.8 million gallons of water to drill a single well. Large-scale extractions of ground and surface water can threaten drinking water supplies and upset the balance of local ecosystems.
"In the debate about natural gas drilling one question looms large," said Tracy Carluccio, Deputy Director of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network. "What are the risks of rushing ahead with the dangerous extraction practices that the industry is using to force gas out of deep shale deposits?"
Despite these questions, and the public health and environmental risks associated with hydraulic fracturing, the practice of using it to extract gas from shale is on the rise. Shale gas grew from 1 percent of the U.S. natural gas energy supply in 2000 to 20 percent in 2010. It is expected to expand further as many companies eye the potential energy reserves trapped within the Marcellus Shale. The first reported Marcellus Shale well in Pennsylvania was drilled in 2003, and by May of 2010, 1,164 wells had been drilled in the portion of the Marcellus Shale under that state alone.
The industry's rapid expansion may be due in part to the federal government's lax oversight. The Energy Policy Act of 2005, for instance, exempts hydraulic fracturing from the section of the Safe Drinking Water Act that protects groundwater from chemical contamination. This may be attributed to the industry's lobbying efforts. The Natural Gas Alliance has spent $1.6 million since 2009 convincing Congress to favor its particular interests.
With the federal government doing little to protect consumers and the environment, opposition against the industry is gaining momentum on the local level. In 2008, New York moved to require companies to reveal the chemicals they use, and Governor Patterson demanded that the state update its environmental review process that approves new hydraulic fracturing projects. Lawmakers in Pennsylvania, Delaware and Texas have established moratoriums on further drilling.
Residents and activists in Colorado, where the process has been in place for more than twenty years, still have concerns. "How many more times are policymakers going to allow industry profits to matter more than public health?" said Josh Joswick, Energy Issues Organizer for the San Juan Citizen's Alliance in Durango, Colorado. "There needs to be public disclosure of what is being injected into our waters."
In regions rich with natural gas deposits that the industry is looking to exploit, activists are encouraging governments to act to protect consumers and the environment from the effects of hydraulic fracturing before it's too late. "With the hydrofracking industry's recent interest in expansion into Virginia, we have an opportunity to take a hard look at what this has meant for communities and natural resources in other states," said Kate Wofford, Director of Shenandoah Valley Network. "Our localities now have a chance to work with the Commonwealth to impose safeguards that will protect water sources and citizens, rather than allowing gas companies to drill first and ask questions later."
Many experts are calling on the federal government to step up its efforts to prevent the natural gas industry from inflicting more damage. The Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act, which is currently moving through Congress, would close the loophole that excludes hydraulic fracturing from the regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act.
"The long-term safety of public water is more important than an indefinite energy resource. That is why the federal government needs to act swiftly to protect the public from this reckless industry, and to seek safe, sustainable energy production methods," noted Hauter.
Not so Fast, Natural Gas: Why Accelerating Risky Drilling Threatens America's Water is available here: http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/water/report/natural-gas/
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18 Comments so far
Show AllThere is nothing 'natural' about earth gas; it's the third member of the triumvirate of carbon cretins that wreck our environment and our health. The other two are 'clean' coal and petroleum oil. And the evidence is in: they are NOT the answer to America's future energy needs. Hydrofracking for gas has wrecked many of our States' environments and drinking water. Chesapeake Energy with the help of Haliburton's poison drilling fluids is about to start drilling in New York State. We must STOP them before they do irreversible damage to its rivers and streams.
How is it that when we know that we must curtail burning fossil fuels, we just keep doing it? We all know the answer, though, don't we? Our leaders have made it so.
Maybe it's just the asinine political ads I've been watching lately, but I am so sick of cretins making all the decisions in this country, cretins that achieved their position only through ambition, never through intelligence. They can't create arguments on their own, they can't defend the arguments of others, they can't articulate their opinions about any subject they have not examined before (because they have no underlying set of values). Quite often, their appearance got them to the forefront, not anything they wrote, said, or did. They are not intelligent enough to figure out the consequences of any course of action, especially the course they are recommending.
I am simply done with listening to them. The very Earth is crumbling because of their shortsighted, foolish actions--and they are too blunt to understand even that simple fact. My only question to them will be--if I could ever rouse myself to attend one of their events--is, Having been in a position of power and observing the catastrophe that is engulfing the world, do you ever feel guilt over the things you did and didn't do? Do you feel you need to make atonement? Do you ever join with us--those that saw this coming thirty years ago--and feel the awful despair we feel? Of course, the answer will be a simple, "No." They just don't get it.
We need to organize a NEW PARTY to fight them.
The Democrats and Republicans are NOT working for us. They are working for multi-national corporations.
A successful coup d'etat has occurred in the United States without having fired a single shot.
It's time to organize and fight BOTH parties and to stop merely bitching about what they've done.
Voting for ANY Democrat in November won't solve a thing.
Completely agree --
One further proof of this attempt by ObamaDLC to move the Democratic Party further
into DLC/corporatism has been his repeated attacks and undermining of Democrats
in Congress. See Pelosi on that today re Gibbs statements -- and her previous
concerns about White House comments. We need to organize a NEW PARTY to fight them.
The only way the right wing can rise is via political violence and we've had
more than 50 years of that -- en plain air.
Americans have to wake up to what you are saying --
QUOTE ...
The Democrats and Republicans are NOT working for us. They are working for multi-national corporations.
A successful coup d'etat has occurred in the United States without having fired a single shot.
It's time to organize and fight BOTH parties and to stop merely bitching about what they've done.
Voting for ANY Democrat in November won't solve a thing. UNQUOTE
.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
I really like the this fracking thingy.
They drill anywhere from 12 to 16 punctures into
the earth's crust on one site......
It is amazing technololgy, it only takes about
one millions gallons of water per well, and that means
only 12 to 20 million gallons of fresh water to get
this "natural" gas....WHAT A GAS..........................
Go Pennsylvania Go
I wish someone would go on Counter Currents.org and read some of the articles on Peak Oil. I know this isn't going to change anything in terms of the powers that be, stopping their stupid chase their tails for more oil. But, it does give some kind of gratification that they won't be able to make billions of dollars in the years coming down the road. As the supply of oil dwindles every year, so does their EROI or the Energy Return on Investment. In this term, the investment isn't money directly, but how much oil it takes to get oil and how much of what you get is extra, over and above what you put in, or net energy. As this net energy dwindles, the greedy pigs will make less and less. Yes, I know the price to buy it will go up but over all,eventually there is so little of it, it becomes a problem. Any way
don't go by my explanation, read what peak oil means for modern civilization.... With out oil, we don't have one.
As for alternatives, they are great for the individual, I'm great with that but you can't run an empire on alternatives and I'M GREAT WITH THAT TOO....
But you'll see that life won't be so rosy... The scenarios are written, you just have to read them.
The crisis we are facing has nothing to do with producing energy -- it has to
do with capitalists and criminality -- and their control of our natural resources
which they do not want to surrender to new innovations --
Sen. Al Franken was just talking today on the Senate floor about the University
of Minnestota's work with solar cells --
Our problem isn't with discovering new alternatives and innovations but in keeping
capitalists from destroying them!
Look at Obama giving nuclear industry $36 Billion!! An industry which is
uninsurable except by the government which has the potential to destroy us --
while creating waste so dangerous we can't figure out what to do with it!
Monopolies work to the detriment of the nation and the planet -- our very survival
depends on ending capitalism and its suicidal concepts.
ExxonMobil has been blocking information about Global Warming and spread
disinformation and misinformation about it for 50 years --
How do you think they and the oil industry might have been reacting to solar
and wind and other alternative energy which threatened them?
See: Royal Academy of Science on ExxonMobil
Agree with you ... no oil/no wars -- which is what makes oil a "national security"
issue -- see "3 Days of the Condor" for one explanation on that --
Oil or gas -- same owners
.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
We must form a new party like you said. There is not one good person working for us. I just don't understand why these people that are doing the fracking don't care one bit about human lives. Also our goverment how can they not care. What kind of country will we have if all the water is bad ? How will that benifit the rich guys ? Dead land and water will not bring prosperity. It is almost as if they want us to die, bring on armenggedan and the predictions of the end of days. If all your customers are dead were is the profit ? I saw that Gasland show on HBO and wonder why the news people do not tell us these things. Instead they talk about basketball players that are way way over paid, and movie stars that don't go to drug rehab. I do not care about that krapt that stuff should be on entertainment tonite or some goofy show not the top story of the NEWS ! If we do not get rid of the leaders we have now we will all keep suffering, until we unite as a new group to defend our way of life which does not include raping our land we are all loosers.
It is hard to come to belive the reality, but you're correct . . .
the very concept of capitalism and its exploitation of nature, natural resources,
animal-life -- and even other humans -- is suicidal.
Yes -- we need to form a new party -- as quickly as possible --
Certainly labor has long known that --
Certainly feminists have long known that --
Certainly African Americans and minorities have long known that --
Certainly any concerned with the environment have long known that --
Right now Obama is taking up where Bush left off in trying to destroy
and privatize Social Security and Medicare -- how many Americans know that?
Let's go!!
But keep in mind that the right wing/elites/royalists never give up --
RW Corporate Democrats/DLC have at times been able to co-opt the Green Party --
and the RW Republicans/Democrat owners now will continue to move the
Democratic Party to the right -- and corrupt anything else they need to!
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
The Green Party knows it too.
When do we stop typing and start revolting? When do we stop bemoaning all the insults to humanity and the Earth from these goddamn murderous corporations and begin either taking them over or burning them down? Are we condemned to nothing but verbalizing our outrage? Is this as good as it gets? They are LAUGHING at us. All we have is impotent raging verbiage.
Indeed they are......At least you are one of the ones
that understand that there is no political process left
in the good ole U.S. of A...
Don't know how we will all start marching, but we need to.
That is just why I have been so critical of journalists.
We can't organize this without media help, nothing will happen
without it. It seems like Greenwald and maybe just one or two
others that have a wide readership are the only ones ready to
put their career on the line to help capture our government back.
I am not revolting although some people may disagree but what do they know about anything except nothing. All our Native prophecies tell us things will be like this one day. People of Native heritage tended to listen to the their Prophets while in the Israelites culture they tended to kill them.
People of Native heritage tended to consider their Prophets to be the servants of Creator. Through Creator and the Spirit they could see things far into what you call the Future and what the Future would really be according to Creator, not man.
People of Native heritage often to consider death to just be a thing, and not a thing to fear. They often consider their life came from Creator and their life has a certain span of time given to them by Creator until they leave this earthly realm that is one thing but often people of Native heritage consider this earthly realm even to be all of it's own illusion.
But we were given our lives by Creator to enjoy in this earthly realm. To take care of one another as best we were able and to take care of Creator's creation during out lifetime. But that pretty much went out the window as soon as Columbus sailed.
So there isn't any revolting by me. I will try my best never to be harmful to even a single human being. But what others chose to do is up them and their decisions in life.
Life is good. What an experience! It's always best to forgive.
"So there isn't any revolting by me. I will try my best never to be harmful to even a single human being. But what others chose to do is up them and their decisions in life."
Nice sentiments. Honestly. I respect that.
But I tell you just as honestly that attitude will not help you if/when the American Empire decides it's time for you to leave this life. I don't think you would honestly just passively accept your death without resisting even a little bit.
Non violence and forgiveness are fine up to a point. But when it's either fight or die trying, in defense of yourself or those you love, most people put up a hell of a fight. I am descended from a people who were proud, fierce, and passionate. They were invaded by Rome, Anglo-Saxons, Norse, and the Franks. They were poets, artists, artisans, musicians, druids, potters, hunters, warriors, farmers, husbands, wives, sons and daughters. And while they may have been occupied, their culture and spirit were never defeated. They faced plague, fire, flood, famine and conquest and never once surrendered *who* they were. Can you say the same?
Someone once said: "It is better to die on your feet than live on your knees." What is your choice?
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
Save your hustle for someone who buys into such things in this world.
Life is good. What an experience! It's always best to forgive.
What's new? They've been doing that before. Just check a few metro buses if you get to visit Washington DC. They've been doing this with coal and nuclear too. Cleaner sources of energy exist but nobody's paying attention. Raise the prices to at least $5 a gallon and keep it higher for at least a year and then we'll see who listens.
http://www.aogc.state.ar.us/ an AR oil & gas regulations site.
lots of sand is being mined also in AR, for the frack process.
the water in AR is easy to get, just pump it out of the lake or whatever. lots of jobs, semi drivers, geologists, equip. operators, rock quarries are thrilled. lots of these employees come from all parts of the world. So like elsewhere the jobs argument outweighs any other concern. there is a little gov. oversite in the permitting area.
really there just hasn't been a good argument made yet that 'crushing rock layers' is a bad thing, except for the toxic solutions pushed into it, probably wayyyyyy deeper than any water well layers of rock.
typically also... by the way... most wells are 'cased' whether properly or not... but the casing prevents the water table/gas well contamination. not withstanding that you may have a guy or two around..that has found gas in his water tap. which can be a bit of a problem if you let your house fill up with the gas part.
whocares;)