Essay about Fracking: Drinking Water and New York

In this research paper we will cuss and discuss the effects that “Hydraulic Fracturing” has had on the environment, the economy, and human life in general. This will be essential in rationalizing the overall effects it has had on the planet Earth, and those therein. This paper will also examine how “Fracking” works, and it will bring to light the good, the bad, and the ugly. The truth about fracking is that it is quickly becoming a nightmare for both the environment and humans alike, because there aren’t enough state or federal policies to help monitor and reduce the pollution it creates.

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.

It is a fact that in Wyoming they are finding contamination in water tables as far away from fracking as forty miles. You tube videos of people igniting their tap water are numbered in the hundreds. These gas companies are poisoning our environment and destroying people’s entire way of life just to make money. Now most of us on some level are concerned about the environment, you don’t have to live in a tree and only eat organic fruits and vegetables to care about the future of earth. You just have to open your eyes and become comfortable to the fact that big corporations dictate government. These people live to make money, at all costs.

Thesis: Hydraulic fracturing is not “the energy solution to the future” (Johnson). Through an in depth look at the current energy crisis, a detailed study of

Few issues have recently gotten as much attention as the energy extraction activities involving a controversial procedure called "fracking." As reports of drinking water becoming tainted with fracking fluid flood the news, both oil and gas companies as well as environmental groups are presenting competing "facts" about the effects of drilling on ground water.

Hydraulic Fracking is the act of shooting or drilling chemicals and liquids into the ground at a high speed in order to break the rocks and earth below. When you break the rocks, or fracture them, it releases the natural gas that is trapped inside. Fracking is a controversial topic, with benefits seen by some and devastating results seen by others. The state of Texas allows fracking, and it is a technique used all over the state. The Obama administration and the federal government believe that fracking can lead the country away from dependence on fossil fuels and into a new generation of clean energy. However, environmental agencies believe that fracking is just another energy source that is no better for the environment than coal, and leads to contaminated water. Fracking companies do not have to follow the Safe Water Drinking Act of 1974, whose purpose is to protect groundwater for the people.

It’s been over 65 years since fracking first began as a method of extraction by oil and gas companies, but the government has done little to regulate the catastrophic practice. How anyone could consider injecting tens of thousands of gallons of water and chemicals deep into the ground being a good idea is beyond me. Those chemicals include chlorine, acetone, benzene, formaldehyde, ammonia, and almost 600 other chemicals that fracking operations won’t even reveal to the public. These chemicals, despite denial by all major natural gas and oil companies that practice fracking, almost always end up in groundwater supplies. I’m sure you’ve seen at least one video online of someone who lives near a fracking site lighting the water coming out of their faucet on fire. Thanks to a ruling in 2005 under the Bush administration, fracking operations are exempt from the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean

Fracking promoters say safe hydraulic fracking doesn’t threaten drinking water. They also disprove that the water used in hydraulic fracturing ends up as surface spills. There are three ways reported for waste water disposal including “injecting in permitted disposal wells in accordance with Underground Injection Control Regulations, delivered to water treatment facilities depending on permitting, and reused/recycled” (“Pioneering America’s Energy Future”). These three types of disposals are considered safe as long as agencies are regulating hydraulic fracturing companies carefully. The Oil and Gas Conservation Act makes oil and gas a state priority, allowing companies the legal right to fracture. It is harder to judge whether regulations are actually set in place when government wants to favor the creation of jobs and economic boost rather than worrying about the health of communities affected by

Fracking explained: opportunity or danger. YouTube. N.p., 3 Sept. 2013. Web. 13 Apr. 2016. .

Cooley, Heather, and Kristina Donnelly. " Hydraulic Fracturing and Water Resources: Separating the Frack from the Fiction" . Oakland: n.p., 2012. Print.

These environmental and social harms develop because the oil and gas industries and the Native nations' governments externalize costs of environmental and social protections onto the public in order to reap the benefits of saved costs” all the harm to our water is real and only we the consumers can stop it..The U.S is a high user of fracking methods as it is the cheaper version to achieve natural gas . According to Shale gas and fracking: The Science Behind the Controversy, that number almost doubled to 510,000, by 2010. Each year about 13,000 new wells are drilled near safe drinking water and a study released in 2011 by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency that some drinking water that comes up from shallow wells near hydrofracking drilling sites in Pennsylvania had about 17 times as methane as those far away from drilling. Imagine the danger that this water can cause to people, one always thinks that natural water is good for use and that the government will not let companies contaminate our limited water

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.

Fracking is the process where pressurized water is injected into shale beds, or layers of sedimentary rock, which opens the rock to release oil and natural gas. Fracking is dangerous for many reasons, but one of the strongest affects it has is on our drinking water. Anywhere from 2 to 8 million gallons of water are used to frack only one well. Shockingly, just 10 percent of the water used returns to the surface. However, water isn’t the only thing being put in the ground- a “toxic stew” of chemicals and sand are also added. Over 40,000 gallons of chemicals are used every time we frack. The chemicals in the fracking mixture can make its way to our groundwater, harming the

Hydraulic Fracturing or Fracking for short is the process of pumping water, sand, and numbers of chemicals into deposits of Marcellus Shale to release the natural gas that is trapped under ground. Fracking is a process that is the center of debate between well companies and environmentalists. Pennsylvania is a huge center of Hydraulic Fracturing so much that there is a town called Frackville. These small mountain towns are few and far in between. The rest of the area is untouched wilderness besides the Hydraulic Fracking wells that intrude on this pristine land. Hydraulic Fracturing needs to be highly monitored and regulated and the people affected by it firsthand should be aware of what exactly is being pumped into their backyards. Natural

Hydraulic fracking like burning coal and oil allow us to carry out our daily functions by providing energy to fuel our modern day cars, cell phones, televisions, and just about anything and everything we depend on. However, hydraulic fracking has been found to be more detrimental to human health, the environment, and economy. With this, fracking is a common practice that has become misconceptualized to be a cleaner alternative to oil and coal, but we must not undermine its potential effects.