Geologists have found huge natural gas reserves in shale all over North America–much of it under the feet of Americans. There may be enough natural gas to sate our energy monster’s appetite for as long as 100 years.
Fracking is the term created by George P. Mitchell a few years ago naming the process of releasing the gas from the earth. Since Mitchell and his team started using fracking, shale gas has risen from a mere one percent of natural gas supplies in 2000 to 30 percent today. The glut is not over–the percentage will go higher.
In the immediate future that would seem to completely solve our stationary energy needs until scientists can develop greener, renewable means of creating power. Fuel for vehicles will take more work.
Natural gas burns cleaner than oil and coal. We seem to have tons of it so it should be much cheaper.
An additional boon is the creation of jobs. It will take thousands, perhaps millions of people working on American soil to get the gas out of the ground and into homes and businesses. Jobs galore will be created beyond the drilling and refinery work as towns will have to be created or expanded ala Boulder City, Nevada when the Hoover Dam was built.
A cleaner, cheaper job creator–what possibly could be the downside?
Our first clue to the dark side of shale gas fracking comes from Eric Oswald (possibly Erik). Mr., or likely Dr. Oswald (he is hard to research) is the calm, smiling face on the Exxon-Mobil television commercial promoting the safety of fracking. Oswald is a real employee and a geologist–not an actor.
As Oswald reassures us, fracking is done miles deep in the earth and the company has no greater interest, according to Oswald, than to take great care and be sure the process is safely done. As proof, Oswald then offers a diagram of a pipe being driven miles deep into the ground, suddenly taking a right turn, and running miles farther parallel to the surface. In the diagram are areas of concrete collars and other safety measures planted along the way.
Here’s where the whole idea starts to get scary. The diagram offered by Exxon-Mobil is a clone to the diagram offered by British Petroleum in 2010 assuring us that drilling in the Gulf of Mexico was as safe as sleeping in your own beds.
These people are jet propelling water and chemicals miles deep underground to break apart solid rock areas that have been the foundation of Earth’s surface for millions of years.
What could possibly go wrong?
Earthquakes for one. There have already been fracking related quakes reported in the southeastern United States and Lancashire, England. Water pollution for another. The industry assures us through “New York Times” columnist David Brooks, “if done right this should not contaminate freshwater supplies.”
Given oil companies’ track records, that statement is not particularly reassuring. In fact, there have already been instances of contamination found and blamed on “rogue companies who screwed up.”
Massachusetts Institute of Technology is sited, surely to take advantage of its prestige and get the full weight of responsibility off the oil companies’ shoulders, professing 20,000 shale wells have been drilled in the last 10 years and “for the most part” the record is good.
It’s that “for the most part” that has me worried. It won’t take many earthquakes, contaminated water sites, or fouled air from truck and construction traffic in existing neighborhoods to create major health and even safety of life concerns.
We are and will continue doing this because the benefits seem to outweigh the negatives. The Obama administration has presented information promoting fracking and at the same time has been investigating the possible unwanted results. A balance between the industry and environmentalists must be reached.
This process is the poster child calling out desperately for regulation.
The oil industry has to actually put safety before enormous profits and the government must earnestly monitor and see that regulations are being followed. This will require a huge reversal in standard operating procedures for both, but if this gift of shale gas is to be used until renewable energy means mature that is exactly what must happen.
Terry Donnelly is a retired teacher and the author of “First You Hear Thunder” a novel retelling events and history of the civil rights movement. For more on the book go to www.firstyouhearthunder.com and for more of Terry’s writings, both opinion and fiction, go to www.firstyouhearthunder.blogspot.com.