The Natural Gas Production Of The United States Essay

for approximately 20 years.7 Once hydraulic fracturing was commercialized, independent gas companies quickly pursued the opportunity. Today, nine companies compete for shale gas production in the U.S., and the major oil companies have moved more slowly since the smaller firms were the originators of fracking technologies.8 Hydraulically fracked wells in the U.S. today total over 500,000 and continue to grow rapidly.9 Another key factor which allowed rapid shale gas development is that U.S. law provides that landowners also own the natural minerals under their property, which enabled shale gas developers to lease land for drilling directly from homeowners (in most other countries, the government owns minerals found under properties). Future success with clean energy will require collaboration between the U.S. Government and industry, and our leaders must commit to advancing this agenda in parallel with the continued development of U.S. shale resources.

Shale is found in many colors but those that are very dark or black contain oil and gas. Conventional drillers look for pools of oil and gas above shale rock. “The oil and natural gas migrated out of the shale and upwards through the sediment mass because of their low density. The oil and gas were often trapped within the pore spaces of an overlying rock unit such as sandstone. These types of oil and gas deposits are known as "conventional reservoirs" because the fluids can easily flow through the pores of the rock and into the extraction well”. (Geology.com King) Conventional drilling into shale has declined because those conventional supplies are disappearing and drilling companies have known this for quite some time. They also know that more oil and gas can be extracted. Geology.com’s Hobart King provides this insight. “Although drilling can extract large amounts of oil and natural gas from the reservoir rock, much of it remains trapped within the shale. This oil and gas is very difficult to remove because it is trapped within tiny pore spaces or adsorbed onto clay mineral particles that make-up the shale. In the late 1990s natural gas drilling companies developed new methods for liberating oil and natural gas that is trapped within the tiny pore spaces of shale. This discovery was significant because it unlocked some of the largest natural gas deposits in the world” (King Geology.com). The site goes on to provide this outlook for fracking oil

There is a lot of controversy over the new practice of getting to fresh natural gas stored in the shale under our feet. The process has been named hydraulic fracturing, and as you can imagine, it involves water (hydro) and breaking stuff (fracking). The results that many people have been experiencing close to where this technique is used seem to be having

Fracking or hydraulic fracturing is a mine stimulation technique that is taking the country by storm. It is a multi-billion dollar industry and in some parts of the country there are so many wells clustered together that they can be seen from space. The commodity being mined is natural gas. Natural gas has earned itself many new names depending on who is asked. According to big gas companies like Haiburton, it’s America’s solution to the energy crisis and a fuel for the 21st century. They claim this current period of economic and energy prosperity is due to increased fracking. However, this prosperity does not come without a cost. Many landowners, environmentalists, and scientists claim the process is poisoning the air, ground, water,

Bob Weinhold, a member of the Society of Environmental Journalists, has been investigating environmental health issues since 1996. He continues to expose the public to the consequences of environmental abuse. His article “The Future of Fracking,” analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in their efforts made to regulate and improve the current state of toxic air emissions produced by hydraulic fracturing sites in the United States. Weinhold successfully presents technological and economic benefits of oil and natural gas drilling but counters these successes by considering the damage that current fracking sites and future fracking sites have on human and environmental health. The information he

However, fracking fluid is not the only questionable aspect of fracking, included is land and infrastructure degradation, physiological harm to local citizens, utilization of legislation loopholes, and the secrecy of fracking fluid formulas within the industry. Nonetheless, the negative attributes of fracking, such as fracking fluid dispersal and other environmental issues are outweighed by the vast economic gains and can be mitigated by a system of regulations and development of new technologies for the industry. The fracking industry will only increase in size, so much so that reclamation of shale gas is called “eminent shale gas revolution. British Petroleum [BP], for instance, expects global shale gas production to grow six-fold from 2011 to 2030. Shale gas production in the United States already accounts for roughly 30 percent of the nationwide total a growth rate up from only 4 percent in 2005” (Sovacool, 251). It has also been estimated that more than “80 percent of the natural gas wells developed in the United States over the next ten years are expected to require fracking and it is projected that by 2035 natural gas wells will represent more than a 75 percent share of the domestic supply” (Bleiwas, 68).

This report presents information regarding the industry, the primary operator of oil and gas field properties. The industry fuels its key buyers, the Natural Gas Distribution (22121) and the Petroleum Refining (32411) industries, with crude oil and natural gas. The industry continuously battles a shortage of available oil. In addition, many major oil fields have been in use for decades, slowly waning. Currently, the industry grosses among the most profitable in the US despite these and similar obstacles. The benefits of investing here

In 1848, James Marshall discovered a single nugget of gold in the American River in California, setting off a massive migration west as hundreds sought to capitalize upon the Gold Rush. Today, a similar situation is playing out. In the late 2000s, new technology enabled workers to extract natural gas from previously inaccessible shale deposits through horizontal hydraulic fracturing. This “shale boom” has had companies racing to capitalize upon the potential of vast natural gas and promises of energy independence and cheap energy. Yet, as the miners during the Gold Rush found upon arriving to California, scientists today are finding that many of the initial claims are not as they seemed. Companies are recklessly continuing, prospecting for natural gas deposits. Hydraulic fracturing is a means of extracting natural gas from deep, previously inaccessible shale deposits. It involves injecting a fracking cocktail mixture of water, sand, and various other chemical fluids into the ground at very high pressures to literally fracture the ground, releasing natural gas that can then be collected. Natural gas is a finite fossil fuel, yet due to the recent fracking boom, many people in the United States have heralded it as the future of America’s energy, the way to energy security.

Christopher Skroupa stated, “As consumer and stakeholder, how do we sort out the debate on fracking—it’s risks and opportunities—and how do we insert a “sanity check” into its politics?” (“The Politics of Fracking”). Comparing hydraulic fracturing to wind, solar, nuclear, and coal is an important step in determining it’s value.

With an end goal to enlighten a portion of the subtleties of this vitality talk about, the Penn Wharton Public Policy Initiative as of late held a course titled, "Fracking, Environmental Policy, and Economic Growth," directed by Sarah Light, a teacher of legitimate reviews and business morals at Wharton. Alternate members were: Kathryn Klaber, previous CEO of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, the biggest association speaking to organizations required in Pennsylvania 's regular gas penetrating blast; Scott Perry, agent secretary at the workplace of oil and gas administration at the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), and Trevor Penning, chief of the Center of Excellence in Environmental Toxicology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine.

Adam Mayer was featured in ScienceDirect with his paper, "Risk And Benefits In A Fracking Boom: Evidence From Colorado”. This article is available through the online source EBSCO and a hardcopy version though The Extractive Industries and Society Journal published by Elsevier Ltd in 2016. While Mayer has no listed qualifications himself, he represents Colorado State University, one of the most influential and environmentally forward universities in our state. Using both primary and secondary sources, Mayer analyzes how hydraulic fracturing has created a boom in production of oil and gas throughout the United States and how Colorado has seen and dealt with the effects more directly. This ScienceDirect paper was written to educate the public

“Should Australia continue to allow coal seams to be mined when the environmental impacts are unknown ?”

Changes with the process of fracking often called slick water high pressure horizontal drilling have become common in recent years are having devastating effects on people, their livestock as well as on communities as a whole. The toxic and often carcinogenic chemicals used in the process and as a result of the methods used are often contaminating water supplies. Air quality is also being greatly affected due to side effects from this method of resource extraction and greenhouse gas emissions both created by technology and equipment fails. Several social conflicts and issues arise around this practice too. This video considered these problems as well as the ethicacy of policies, industry practices, and behavior surrounds fracking operations. We will be looking at the ethical evaluation of this practice by Rabbi Mordechai Liebling from Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and support for his perspective of the ethical practices by other participants in this documentary. Rabbi Liebling approaches the issue of the practice of fracking by the oil and gas industry from a land ethic point of view.

With having 400,000 natural gas wells across the United States this creates thousands of jobs for people. In 1980 fracking companies supported 267,000 employees according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (Hassett, Kevin A.) In 2011 alone the United States produced 850,983 cubic feet of natural gas from shale gas wells (The Numbers.) Per thousand cubic feet of natural gas costs about 4.24 dollars, this comes out to a profit around 36 billion dollars (Hassett, Kevin A.) Not only does it have large profits but it has a huge direct effect on trade balance with the US and other countries. Between 2007 and 2011 natural gas imports decreased by 25 percent, with this four year decrease Energy Information Administration predicts that the USA will become a net exporter of natural gas by 2020 (Hassett, Kevin A.) Though “The word in the world of independents is that the shale plays are just giant Ponzi schemes and the economics just do not work,” says a spokesperson from IHS Drilling Data, an energy research company (The Numbers.) Shocking news that the economics just do not work with the gas companies many are finding out that it’s not as cheap to extract from the shale as the they intended it to be (Hunt, Spencer.) According to hundreds of industry emails and internal documents, and an

The oil and gas industries involve a high amount of documentation for both transportation as well as extraction and field services. Activities are highly regulated, and subject to oversight from Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), the Department of Transportation (DoT), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Department of the Interior (DoI). That said, the process of regulation is trending toward a more digitized system, with organizations like FERC having their own submission portals that implement a “fill-in-the-blank” platform to complete forms. However, not all forms have yet been converted to digital submission even in agencies with online portals, and other agencies still remain reliant on