Fracking Essay

In “Fracking” authors Michael D. Holloway and Oliver Rudd cover the technology and methods of hydraulic fracturing while explaining the consequences it has on our health, agriculture, and the planet. The two set out to expose the truths and fallacies regarding impacts of the controversial topic. Throughout the book excerpt, the authors reiterate their goal of not making false claims; “the goal is to educate and share insight.” The authors work to relieve the public of common hydraulic fracking related misconceptions brought on by the media. While the majority of citizens opposed to fracking report contamination to their water source and air, the authors’ collected studies reveal that these problems are not unique to fracking; they occur whenever

Natural gas is the transitional fuel that is cleaner than coal and oil that has been experiencing a boom in the United States for the last few decades. Natural gas is most familiar to us in the form of heating and cooking on gas ranges. It is abundantly available and modern technology has made it much more accessible and cheaper than other energy sources. Hydraulic fracturing, known short as fracking, is the combination of technology with water and chemicals, and high pressure, that breaks through shale rocks to capture energy. The Climate One podcast titled “ Fracking Boom,”explains America’s recent obsession with fracking, surrounding its history, economic stimulus, construction, and community opposition among other issues. Presenting the talk were Russell Gold, author of The Boom: How Fracking Ignited American Energy Revolution and Changed the World, Mark Zoback, professor of Geophysics at Stanford University, and Trevor Houser, co-author of Fueling Up: The Economic Implications of America’s Oil and Gas Boom. The three guest speakers shared their expertise on how the fracking boom can power America’s economy, but can only be successful if the process in making the wells for fracking, are done along guidelines within the regulations.

Hydraulic fracturing is also known as “fracking” is a technique which involves drilling down, then horizontally as far as 10,000 feet below the surface to release natural gasses stored in the sedimentary rock known as Shale. The channel is then encased with concrete or occasionally steel to allow millions of gallons of water to be injected into the wellbore. Most water used in fracking comes from surface water sources such as rivers, lakes, or other accessible bodies of water nearby. Not only is there water being funneled into the wellbore, but also a mixture of sand and other chemicals. When the high-pressure mixture is injected underground it fractures the Shale around the wellbore and creates fissures. The fissures are then held open with

To environmental advocates and opponents of fracking, the process is more than dollars and cents. On a rudimentary level, the oil and natural gas produced via hydraulic fracturing are fossil fuels, and thus harmful to the environment in comparison to renewable, clean sources of energy such as solar and wind power. These renewable energy fields are likewise capable of bolstering American energy production and independence and creating high paying careers. Moreover, research suggests that fracking practices could cause serious methane leaks, canceling out the supposed reduction in greenhouse gas

This article tries to advocate fracking by giving insights on how safe fracking is for the environment. To begin with, a brief description is given as to how fracking is done to extract natural gas. Views of Manhattan Institute senior fellow Robert Bryce which compare the CO2 emissions in 2002 and 2012 show a drop of 8% due to surge in shale gas production, which reduced coal usage. Water usage and other resources like land and habitat protection for wild animals has been presented in the article to highlight how fracking is much environment friendly compared to other energy sources, even wind and solar.

Hydraulic fracturing, also referred to as fracking, remains a very controversial issue in the world today. Fracking, a widely debated technological innovation, involves drilling deep down into the Earth’s surface to obtain natural gas (Shuckman 1). Natural gas, a flammable substance produced deep within the Earth’s surface and exploited as fuel, is obtained by pumping water, sand and chemicals into open passages, which allows the natural gases to move into production wells (Shuckman 1). Hydraulic fracturing enables necessities such as heating, cooking and electricity for Americans; however, oppositionists claim that it harms the environment and the United State’s residents.

The crisis for obtaining fossil fuels such as oil and natural gases is at an all-time high. With the limited amounts and struggles of obtaining these needed natural resources for everyday use we find ourselves trying new technological advancements to extract these fossil fuels out of the ground. One way of doing so is through the use of fracking. Fracking is the extraction of natural gasses from shell rock deep beneath the earth’s surface. With the new scientific technological advancements of fracking we can obtain natural gasses in ways that were once un-thought of before. In many ways fracking is beneficial, fracking can provide vast amounts of natural gasses which can be used not only in our everyday lives, but can also be beneficial from an economic stand point as well. However, along with the benefits of fracking there also comes some drawbacks. The use of fracking can contaminate our water sources, and can also cause very large amounts of pollution, causing diseases and death. To get a clearer understanding of what fracking can do we must first learn how fracking works, its benefits for our economy, but also its drawbacks on the environment, and draw a conclusion on whether or not fracking is overall more beneficial or harmful.

Hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting oil and natural gas that is better known as fracking, has received extensive media coverage over the years. This attention has come from both supporters and detractors of this contentious issue, and in the process the debate has been increasingly sensationalized. However, even when looking past the publicity, a careful examination of the scientific and legal implications of fracking reveals that the process carries a number of risks. Thanks to these inherent risks, as well as the behavior exhibited by the companies responsible for fracturing operations, allowing fracking to continue unchecked would lead to detrimental conditions that far outweigh the potential benefits.

If John D. Rockefeller, one of the first oil tycoons, were to look at the oil industry today, would he believe his eyes? With millions of oil barrels being imported and exported each year, the oil industry has changed dramatically since the 19th century. At the forefront of the oil industry is the emergence of an oil drilling technique known as fracking. Fracking is an unconventional drilling process that is accomplished by using high-pressured water to release oil and natural gas from rock formations, known as shales. The use of fracking in the United States has made it one of the top oil producing countries in the world. However, this newfound oil and gas drilling method has not come without its costs. Despite the economic boom near drilling locations, politically, fracking has caused some international relationships to be strained. Also, fracking is seen as highly controversial by conservationists because of the environmental threats that it poses. The drilling method of fracking has deeply impacted the United States from an economic, a political, and an environmental standpoint.

In recent years, the subject of hydraulic fracturing, better known as fracking has been a constant subject of interest in the news media. The pros and cons of fracking are passionately debated. However, the public should become educated on the subject of fracking prior to choosing a side of the argument. In the scholarly article, “Super Fracking,” published in 2014, by Donald L. Trucotte, Eldridge M. Moores, and John B. Rundle, a detailed description of fracking is provided, followed by their analysis of current issues surrounding the controversy. According to Trucotte, Moores, and Rundle, fracking saves the consumer money. The wellhead cost to produce natural gas in January of 2000 was two dollars and sixty cents per one thousand cubic feet. At an alarming rate, the cost at the wellhead to produce natural gas had risen to eight dollars per one thousand cubic feet by January of 2006. Comfortingly, the wellhead cost dropped to two dollars and eighty-nine cents by the end of 2012. Impressively, gas production increase and price decrease over the time period are a result of fracking. In their article, Trucotte, Moores, and Rundle describe in great detail that hydraulic fracturing, most commonly referred to as fracking is the process of drilling down into the earth to fracture the layers of rock so that a high-pressure water mixture is directed at the rock to release the oil or natural gas inside. This method of fracking has been used commercially for the last fifty years.

Hydraulic fracturing began in 1947 and still happening until now. People have used fracking to produce more than one million oil and natural gas wells since 1947. Currently "fracking accounts for 50% of locally produced natural gas and 33% of local petroleum” (Engelder 274). It proved that fracking is valuable because people can get too much natural gas and petroleum from fracking. There are 2.5 million "frac jobs" that had been performed on oil and gas wells around the world and more than one million of those are in the United Stated. Oil shale resources are abundant in United States, such as in

We could use plenty other sources, fracking gets oils, meant to burn, to get energy. We have plenty of other ways to get energy that if we put enough work into it we won't need fracking because we have all these other resources. We have wind, water, hydrogen, and sunlight, all these resources can be harvested to use for an energy source. Windmills, water turbines, hydrogen chambers, and solar panels are all ways we can harvest these renewable resources. We should use these resources because it is a cheaper, more efficient, and environmentally safe way to get power and energy. If there was a better way to get energy, it would be through these renewable resources. Fracking is an unneeded resource, we have plenty other energy sources, we don't

The global crisis surrounding energy needs grows in severity as time goes by and in order to solve it, scientists have created the innovative solution known as hydraulic fracturing (Source 5). Hydraulic fracturing, commonly referred to as “fracking,” is a process that injects water, chemicals, sand, and other materials into layers of shale. The injected mixture cracks the layers of shale, releasing trapped natural gasses that can be collected (Source 1). Fracking occurs deep under the surface of the earth, miles below the groundwater that is accessed from drinking-water wells. In the mid-2000s, “fuel prices were rising rapidly” (Source 5). Hydraulic fracturing was a cheap solution that not only brought the world out of a state of emergency but made oil prices drop. The new method of gas collection grew the oil and gas industry, benefiting people all around the world. Fracking is a cheap, effective solution to global needs, but is under attack from skeptics who worry about environmental hazards. The claims against fracking not only have no real evidence but also risk destroying the jobs in the oil and gas industry as well as support for energy needs. Hydraulic fracturing is not only a cheap but a safe method that supports global needs surrounding both energy and jobs.

Hydraulic fracking in the United States is a current environmental hazard that has to be addressed by the American people and by the federal government. Fracking in America has opened up millions of acres of lands that were once not economically viable to produce oil and gas. While the Bureau of land Management has paved the way for hydraulic fracturing on public lands, there is a need for retaliation. Fracking is a dirty method of extracting gases and oils at the price of numerous environmental, safety, and health hazards. The environment is not a means of income when rather it is the capital for future generations.

We are currently in the second decade of this twenty-first century, and the United States has discovered a new type of energy. It is affordable, it burns somewhat cleaner than the other fossil fuels, and there’s so much of it that it could possibly last us over one-hundred years. Only a decade earlier, just the smallest sliver of the United States citizens had ever heard of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Presently, it is easily one of the most explosive environmental topics alight. Previously, wells that were built for this type of shale gas extraction have quickly spread through various areas of the country. This expansion, many argue, outpaces the science available to fully understand its potential impacts. Whether or not fracking is allowed to continue spreading without vast harm to the environment is one of the many questions researchers