Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 24 posts

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#11

Post by jofer »

Most of the discussion about fracking misses the forest for the trees.

Yes, there's a rather significant amount of groundwater contamination due to poorly operated and/or improperly abandoned wells.

However, the vast majority of the contamination has nothing to do with whether or not hydrofracturing was applied. It's far more frequently due to bad casing jobs, etc.

In other words, most of the contamination is due to sloppy work. It would happen regardless of whether it was a convention or unconventional well.

There are situations where fracking can directly lead to contamination. After all, you're deliberately creating permeability in an aquitard. However, these are not anywhere near as common as the cases where a bad casing job, etc can lead to groundwater contamination (every well).

In a nutshell, we're seeing an increase in groundwater contamination because of the spike in the number of wells drilled in the areas. It's not directly related to the completion method used in the well (e.g. fracking).

However, it doesn't help that there are highly variable state/local regulations and a huge number of sloppy operators.

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#12

Post by AC__ »

sliverstorm wrote: post #8
AC__ wrote: post #5

Riiiiiggghht https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LBjSXWQRV8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B9-tmudFg0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U01EK76Sy4A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U01EK76Sy4A There are THOUSANDS of similar reports from fracked areas all over North America. That isn't the only problem either, when they do what's called "venting" there is large release of carcinogenic chemicals(although some large scale o…

In at least some of those areas where those "flammable tapwater" videos have been made, the tapwater has always been flammable, because the natural gas deposits we are fracking have been leeching into the groundwater for millions of years.

Yes and now enjoy methane concentrations 17x higher(I view that as the difference between being potable and not)...http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fracking-for-natur...

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#13

Post by barney54 »

jofer wrote: post #11

Most of the discussion about fracking misses the forest for the trees. Yes, there's a rather significant amount of groundwater contamination due to poorly operated and/or improperly abandoned wells. However, the vast majority of the contamination has nothing to do with whether or not hydrofracturing was applied. It's far more frequently due to bad casing jobs, etc. In other words, most of the contamination is due to…

Where is the evidence that there are a huge number of sloppy operators? That isn't in the NY Times article.

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#14

Post by dbecker »

barney54 wrote: post #13
jofer wrote: post #11

Most of the discussion about fracking misses the forest for the trees. Yes, there's a rather significant amount of groundwater contamination due to poorly operated and/or improperly abandoned wells. However, the vast majority of the contamination has nothing to do with whether or not hydrofracturing was applied. It's far more frequently due to bad casing jobs, etc. In other words, most of the contamination is due to…

Where is the evidence that there are a huge number of sloppy operators? That isn't in the NY Times article.

People in the industry seem to universally agree that there are some sloppy operators.

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#15

Post by clumsysmurf »

I'm a bit skeptical of what the EPA says, because it has been documented to suffer from regulatory capture.

http://www.amazon.com/Poison-Spring-Secret-History-Pollution...

But lets assume the EPA is doing its job. At minimum, there needs to be more inspectors - currently there is a huge backlog where high-risk wells are not being inspected. So this problem will just keep getting worse.

http://www.foreffectivegov.org/blog/massive-fracking-federal...

Also, just a few weeks ago from the NYT:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/05/science/earth/fracking-che...

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#16

Post by dbecker »

punee wrote: post #9

"Worrying over fracking is like seeing an upper middle class family who are $6,000 in debt, and freaking out because one of their kids bought a gumball from a machine." http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-do...

You are taking that quote wildly out of context. That quote refers to the use of water as part of the drilling process, not the contamination of water-sources by fracked wells.

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#17

Post by 13thLetter »

moepstar wrote: post #2

FTFA: But environmental groups pointed to what they saw as holes in the report. In particular, they said, the report’s authors relied on data supplied by companies and wrote that limitations in data “preclude a determination of the frequency of impacts with any certainty.” So, i guess that report is next to worthless then if it solely relies on data that comes from a group that is interested in "proving" the safety o…

No more than if it relied on data that comes from a group that is interested in "proving" that fracking is unsafe.

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#18

Post by kanetkarster »

From Aljazeera:

>the EPA was not able to legally force cooperation by fracking companies, almost all of which refused

and

>One of the companies, Chesapeake Energy, "chipped away at the scope of the plan over two years of talks, limited when and where the EPA could monitor water,"

[0] http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/6/4/epa-says-frac...

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#19

Post by punee »

dbecker wrote: post #16
punee wrote: post #9

"Worrying over fracking is like seeing an upper middle class family who are $6,000 in debt, and freaking out because one of their kids bought a gumball from a machine." http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/05/11/california-water-you-do...

You are taking that quote wildly out of context. That quote refers to the use of water as part of the drilling process, not the contamination of water-sources by fracked wells.

You're absolutely right. I guess I was misled by the title that talks about the "water supply" when they really mean "the quality of water" or something along those lines.

Re: Fracking Has Not Had Big Effect on Water Supply, E.P.A. Says While Noting Risks

#20

Post by AC__ »

danso wrote: post #7
AC__ wrote: post #5

Riiiiiggghht https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LBjSXWQRV8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B9-tmudFg0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U01EK76Sy4A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U01EK76Sy4A There are THOUSANDS of similar reports from fracked areas all over North America. That isn't the only problem either, when they do what's called "venting" there is large release of carcinogenic chemicals(although some large scale o…

OK I downvoted this. And I'm stating that even though I know it's not kosher to have a meta-debate about upvoting/downvoting, but just to dissuade the reflexive suspicion that the downvote is because HN is secretly owned by drilling companies. I don't necessarily disagree with the skepticism, but linking to a bunch of Youtube videos without context is not helpful evidence. And then going on to refer to a vague "THOUS…

They have NO evidence, I downloaded their full report in search of the "official" total of cases where drinking water has been contaminated due to hydraulic fracturing and it is omitted from the report they simply make the assertion that "the number of identified cases, however, was small compared to the number of hydraulically fractured wells" This study doesn't serve to advance our understanding of the hazards of hydraulic fracturing in the least, it's 999 pages of nothing! Down vote all you want
Post reply on HN