Shale gas is an unconventional emerging energy source that since 2008 has had an increase in both conventional and unconventional well inspections which have led to a decrease in violations (Phillips, 2016). In 2015, inspectors issued 404 violations whereas in 2010 inspectors issued 1,280 violations (Phillips, 2016)! In addition, for the year 2015, the Department of Environmental Investigation reported no findings of wrongdoing of water contamination through methane migration by the gas industry. Moreover, the Department of Environmental Protection is the responsible party for reviewing and issuing drilling permits, respondents to water quality problems, and the inspection of drilling operations (Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, 2016). …show more content…
A few pro’s associated with the emerging Shale gas energy source. Firstly, the Department of Environmental Protection is regulating the exploration, development, and recovery of Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoirs in a way that will protect the environment and the commonwealth national resources (Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, 2016). With the extra push from compliance, the additional assistance helps to prevent incidents that may harm the environment. The additional assistance provided also includes preventative workshops for the industry to help applicants as needed to address environmental matters for construction of a well site (Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, 2016). Moreover, the Department of Environmental Protection is also beneficial to Shale gas energy because they work to instruct and advise operators and well drillers on the best management procedures and practices for waste management and environmental control (Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection,
When I was six years old my mother asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up and I told her with a straight face “a paleontologist” at that age I knew how to spell and pronounce all the scientific names for almost every known species of dinosaur at the time and I also knew their feeding habits, habitats, period they inhabited. Fast Forward five years later my career goal had changed to a herpetologist, I envisioned myself treating amphibians and reptiles while performing zoonotic as well as conservative research. From an early age I was fascinated with animals and knew I wanted my future occupation to be involved with them but it wasn’t until I was a sophomore in high school that I was introduced to the possibility of veterinary medicine.
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
In home health, the nurses are in the field, in patient homes and they perform their patient assessment, patient care, and documentation independently. Comprehending that the sequence in which each individual nurse performs their work is variable creates an obstacle to redesigning workflow secondary to the fact that there currently is not a standard workflow (Holman et al., 2016). Moreover, in order to create a standard workflow, observation of a statistically significant number of nurses to determine the most common current workflow would be required prior to any redesign.
Natural gas has been hailed as the solution to the U.S energy problem, but is obtained by the controversial method of fracking. Hydraulic fracking is the process of pumping a mix of water, sand, and chemicals at high pressure to make openings in shale that contain natural gas. The fracking process allows natural gas to be obtained, but at a cost. The use of toxic chemicals can affect the surrounding environment and contaminant water sources. Current regulations have not kept up with the drilling industry. Regulations for fracking should be improved to protect against the use of toxic chemicals, contaminating water sources, and to limit strains on the environment.
Last year alone, oil and gas companies put hundreds of millions of gallons of hydraulic fracturing fluids into the earth. Many of these fluids were found to contain harmful chemicals such as carcinogens- substances that directly cause cancer. This is why hydraulic fracking has been the topic of heated debate over the past few years. This process of drilling for natural gas has become increasingly popular over the past decade, and has in turn produced many questions about the safety of its wells and the chemicals that are used in drilling. Under current regulations, hydraulic fracking is permitted to be conducted at drilling sites that are located very close to residential areas. The chemicals used in the drilling process have been leaking out of wells, and have contaminated drinking water for some communities. In addition, it pollutes the air by putting methane, a potent greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere. Concerned about the safety of fracking, cities such as Longmont have shown great opposition to the Colorado Oil and Gas Association (COGA)’s regulations. In fact, Longmont citizens voted to put a ban on fracking within city limits in 2012. This ban has been met with retaliation from COGA, who sued the city because of the ban. If fracking isn’t allowed to be banned by cities that don’t want it, then the regulations need to change in order to make the practice both prosperous and safe for the community.
The issue of whether we should continue fracking without research has been widely debated around the world. The issue is important because it has fundamental environmental concerns and economic questions about the process of hydraulic fracturing. “Fracking” is the process of penetrating down into the earth before a high-pressure water mixture is absorbed at the rock to release the gas inside. Water, sand, and chemicals are then inserted into the rock with compression which allows the gas to flow out to the head of the well. Fracking fluid, which can be polluted with heavy metals like arsenic, known human carcinogens, has seeped into local waterways and polluted groundwater. People who live near fracking wells have a heightened danger of developing cancer, asthma, and other serious ailments associated with inhaling or ingesting the toxic chemicals involved in the fracking process. Countries approach fracking and researching much differently from each other. The injection of fluid into shale beds at high pressure to extract petroleum resources has been happening across the United States of America at rapid pace. By 2003, a gigantic public relations campaign was launched to lobby Congress to pass what is
Scientists are worried that the chemicals used in fracturing may pose a threat either underground or when waste fluids are handled they are sometimes spilled on the surface which can cause site contamination or find its way back to water clean water. The natural gas industry defends hydraulic fracturing, or fracking as safe and efficient. Thomas J. Pyle, president of the Institute for Energy Research, a pro-industry non-profit organization, claims fracking has been “a widely deployed as safe extraction technique,” dating back to 1949. What Mr. Pyle fails to explain is that until recently energy companies had used low-pressure methods to extract natural gas from fields closer to the surface than the current high-pressure technology that extracts more gas, by digging to deeper levels and it also uses significantly more water, sand and chemicals. There have been serious environmental impacts associated with the process which has raised public concern. At this point, a causal relationship has not been established but increasing attention opens the possibility that further government action could be imminent regarding the practice. According to Baumgartner and
While natural gas may be the “cleanest fossil fuel available,” the process of collecting it is not without environmental concern. At the forefront of environmental issues in fracking are the large use of freshwater in wells and the production of large amounts of wastewater. Hunter (2012) points out that as the fracking boom began, “speculators rushed into hydrofracking … with little attention to how much water would be needed or the best practices for managing the water when they were done with the wells.” As mentioned before, in the year 2012 alone, more than 3 billion gallons of fracking water waste were produced in the state of New Mexico. While “conventional gas production generates 65% more wastewater per unit of recovered gas than fracking does” (Schmidt 2013), the use of water by fracking is still of particular to concern to a state like New Mexico
The shale revolution has provided a new source of natural gas and energy independence for the United States, but it must be carefully regulated to keep our nation’s water supply safe and clean. That’s why I am a firm supporter of the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act. In Congress, I will diligently work to end the “Halliburton Loophole,” which has dangerously exempted fracking from necessary federal environmental regulation, and I will advance efforts to create stronger regulations by the EPA to ensure that hydraulic fracturing is practiced in a safe and environmentally conscious manner.
“A Duke study explains 60 sites in New York and Pennsylvania found explosive levels of natural gas in homes water supply a mile and a half from the drilling”(Stone). In addition to “In December 2011, The U.S. E.P.A. relegated a 121-page report linking the contamination of drinking water wells near the town of Pavillion Wyoming to nearby gas drilling” (Stone). This is becoming a very big problem. Fracking has been widely accepted across the country extremely fast with any regulations. It is time to set down some standards. Flowback is water they suck back out after the fracturing that is where all the chemicals are that they put down there to fracture the shale. When the liquid is sucked back up what do they do with it? They go in holding pits. Holding pits vary from state to state on its own regulations on
Although oil companies uphold the idea that fracking is a cheaper and efficient, fracking damages the local water, air and soil in the surrounding cities. According to the Science of Total Environment, scientists speculate that wells require up to 5 million gallons of fluid per extraction event, which would require tons of chemicals including benzene, carbon monoxide, and nitrogen oxides to unconventionally bring out the shale gas (Werner et al. 2014). The lengthy list of air pollutants, most of which are combustible, suggests that both human health and the environment are at risk and the surrounding water aquifers located near the horizontal wells could also be damaged. The amount of water needed for extraction also demonstrates the strain the process of fracking has on the environment and local water supply. Similarly, the potency of methane is 20 times worse than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas, which is further aggravated by the process of flaring (Weinhold 2012). Thus, flaring and fracking serves not only as a nuisance to the community through the health hazards and water pollution, but can worsen the status of global climate
As the pace of shale gas drilling has accelerated in recent years, so have environmental concerns. Incidents such as a 2007 home explosion in Bainbridge, OH, the 2008 groundwater contamination on Wind River Indian Reservation in Pavilion, WY, and the 2008 chemical poisoning of an emergency room nurse in Durango, CO, have intensified the debate over regulation of fracking.10 As a result, new laws regulating fracking activities have
This scene portrays the nonsense of wonderland and remarks on the absurdity of society, especially the justice system. We find Alice in the middle of a frivolous trial involving someone stealing the Queens tarts. Alice is going through another growth spurt and accidentally knocks over the jury box, filled with various animals, who are the jurors. The King demands that the court cannot go on unless she puts them all back in upright, to which she states that it’s irrelevant. This excerpt, along with many others throughout the novel, highlights the fact that wonderland on the surface is very nonsensical, but when we take a closer look, it has multitudes of meaning and it can even mimic certain aspects of society.
According to former Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, “Hydraulic fracking is very much a necessary part of the future of natural gas.” Hydraulic fracking is a process in which natural gas is yielded from breaking rock formations deep below the ground’s surface. The rock formations are injected with a liquid mixture of water, sand, and several different chemical compounds. Some of these chemicals are known carcinogens if they are ingested in certain quantities. Accordingly, many people fear that if these chemicals collect in drinking water, there is an increased risk of the population developing disease. Additionally, companies are not required by law to reveal the chemicals they are using due to the fact that these are “trade secrets.” Although there are negative aspects of fracking, there are several positive benefits. The process of fracking produces natural gas, which is more environmentally friendly than fossil fuels such as coal and oil. Moreover, nearly thirty-two states have the environmental potential for fracking, which would could greatly benefit these states by increasing revenue and creating more jobs. Currently, fracking procedures are being left for each state to decide how they want to regulate them. This process should be revised due to the fact that there are several environmental and personal health risks that are involved with fracking. The Clean Water Act should be amended in order to allow the EPA to create guidelines for the fracking
Caruso, D. (Jan 3, 2011). 'Fracking' Pollution In Water: Pennsylvania Allows Natural Gas Drilling Waste Disposal In Waterways.