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Nathan Leong
Mr. Hoague
AP Lit and Comp, Period 1
1 March 2016
Dont Frack with my Future
For some, it is a dream come true. For others, it is an environmental nightmare. Since
the discovery of the new drilling technique, hydraulic fracturing or fracking, it is possible to
extract natural gas from previously unreachable shale deposits more than a mile underground.
This has led to a modern day gold rush all over the United States as gas companies rush to tap
into some of the largest shale deposits in the world. As a result of fracking, millions of jobs have
been created and gas prices have been at record lows. However, many people feel that fracking
should be banned because of its potential for environmental destruction and disaster. The use of
hydraulic fracturing as a drilling technique must be banned because of the dangers it poses to the
environment. It is a dangerous and unregulated drilling technique with potentially disastrous
environmental consequences that are detrimental to the overall health of many Americans and
the earth.
The principle ideas of fracking have not changed since 1865 when Lieutenant Colonel
Edward A. Roberts patented the idea of an exploding torpedo. It was an iron shell packed with
gunpowder and tipped with a blasting cap that would explode at a designated depth and fracture
the rock formations around the base of the well to stimulate the release of oil or gas trapped
within shale formations. His inspiration can during the bloody battle of Fredericksburg, Virginia
in 1862, when Lieutenant Colonel Roberts saw the results of Confederate artillery shells
plunging into the narrow canal that obstructed the battlefield (Fracking: A Look Back). His

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new technique was introduced in Titusville, Pennsylvania, and quickly spread throughout all of
the United States during the 1800s and 1900s. Then, on March 17, 1949, a team of Halliburton
and Stanolind petroleum production experts at a well 12 miles away from Duncan, Oklahoma
performed the first commercial application of hydraulic fracturing (Shooters A Fracking
History). This new technique of fracturing a well to increase gas output became a common
practice among gas companies. Although fracking has revolutionized the oil industry and helped
increase oil production in the United States, it must be banned before irreparable damage is done
to the earth.
Although the hydraulic fracturing process is much safer than using explosives, it requires
a substantial amount of water. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),
fracturing operations in a single well can require three to seven million gallons of water, 30
percent of which is unrecoverable from the well... and that fracking the 35,000 active wells in the
United States in 2010 used 70 to 140 billion gallons of water, an amount roughly equivalent to
that used by a city with a population of 3 million (Hyder). The amount of water needed to
fracture a single well is absurd and only 70 percent of that water is recoverable. In addition,
approximately 2 million gallons of water that are left in the ground are full of carcinogenic and
radioactive chemicals. Currently, there is no way to completely drain the rest of the water or
insure that the underground aquifers that many people rely on for water will not be contaminated.
Also, there is the problem of figuring out how to dispose of or store the wastewater. Millions of
gallons of water come back to the surface during and after the fracturing process and the water
can be treated, but in Texas it is most often reinjected into the ground. Millions more gallons of
produced water flow out later during gas production. This flow, too, is often tainted with
radioactivity and poisons from the shale. Often stored in pits, that waste can leak or overflow

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while awaiting reinjection (Clayton). The wastewater that is used in a well is unusable because
of the high toxicity of the water, which is detrimental to the environment and to Americans that
live near fracking sites. The need for a substantial amount of water for fracking puts tremendous
strain on communities that are located in the drought-stricken parts of the United States.
Because fracking requires so much water, smaller communities with limited water infrastructures
are being hit hard. In Texas, a number of small communities in Texas oil and gas country have
already run out of water or are in danger of running out of water in days, pushed to the brink by a
combination of drought and high demand for water for fracking. Also, in Colorado the water
demand for fracking in the state was expected to double to 6 billion gallons; which is twice as
much as the entire city of Boulder uses in a year (Goldenberg). The high demand for water
throughout the nation should be reason enough to ban the use of hydraulic fracturing. Small
communities, cities, and farms are being deprived of precious water because some gas
companies want to make a profit from their oil wells and that needs to stop. Fracking must be
banned because the amount of water required to fracture a well is too much and the resulting gas
is not worth the environmental damage that fracking is causing.
Throughout history, gas companies have experimented with hundreds of different
chemicals and other additives that will enhance the hydraulic fracturing process and make it as
efficient as possible. Although chemicals only make up a fraction of the fluid injected into the
well, the overall volumes are so highup to millions of gallons per wellthat a single well
often requires thousands of gallons of chemicals. Those chemicals sometimes include formic
acid, which can cause blindness; trimethyl ammonium chloride, which can damage the kidneys
and brain, and benzene, which is a known carcinogen. (Song). After the fracking process, water
that flows back up the well must be disposed of. Some gas companies try to treat it, while others

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are accused of dumping hazardous fracking fluid into rivers or streams that are near the drilling
site. While much of the water comes back out, some of the chemicals are left behind in the well
and can seep into the surrounding rock and potentially contaminating nearby water sources.
Anthony Ingraffea, Dwight C. Baum professor of engineering at Cornell University, stated that,
60 percent of oil and gas wells failed within 28 years. These failures can lead to the
contamination of the aquifers that we need to keep clean for drinking water (Ingraffea). Many
Americans will be robbed of their primary source of clean, drinkable water if any oil wells leak
fracking fluid into underground aquifers. Although the wastewater may be treated, fracturing
fluid contains many chemicals that are not easily removed by standard water treatment systems
and the water could still be contaminated after the process is finished. As a result, hazardous
water could be discharged into local rivers and streams and pollute the water system. Instead of
taking clean, usable water and contaminating it with toxic chemicals, the best course of action
would be to ban the practice of fracturing wells and eliminate the possibility of water
contamination.
Besides having to worry about pollution in their water, many Americans must deal with
air and sound pollution if they live near an active drilling site. According to Stephen Riccardi of
PennEnvironment, there are 166 schools, 165 day cares, 21 nursing homes and six hospitals
within one mile of permitted unconventional natural-gas drilling, or fracking, well sites. Within
a two-mile radius, the number of schools and day cares reaches nearly 500 each (Murray). The
drilling process can take a long time and will cause a lot of noise. Anything from construction
activity to truck traffic can cause excessive amounts of noise. This type of pollution is often
overlooked and can negatively affect the people within communities near working sites. The
loud noise could result in hearing loss or mere annoyance of the population. Besides noise

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pollution, fracking also results in air pollution. Global warming is caused by the release of too
many greenhouse gases that trap the earths heat. Methane is one of the most potent greenhouse
gases and can leak during and after fracking. Measurements taken by the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration at gas and oil fields in California, Colorado and Utah found
leakage rates of 2.3 percent to 17 percent of annual production. This is the gas that is released
into the atmosphere unburned as part of the hydraulic fracturing process, and also from pipelines,
compressors and processing units (Ingraffea). The reason for these leaks is not only the well
itself, but poor construction of other equipment that is necessary for the fracking process. Other
chemicals like benzene, a known carcinogen, can, irritate eyes and cause headaches, sore
throats or difficulty breathing (Polson and Efstathiou). Any gases that leak from a well have the
potential to cause major problems for both the environment and the people living near drilling
sites. Although the Environmental Protection Agency has proposed a new regulation that would
require drillers to use gas capturing technologies, there is no way to make sure that there is no
gas leaking from a well. So, fracking must be banned to prevent the release of more dangerous
chemicals into the atmosphere.
As gas companies compete to see who can produce the most gas, concerns for the well
being of Americans and the environment are often cast aside. As experiments are done to find
the most efficient mixture, gas companies will have their own opinions and will be using
different mixtures. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) oversees public land and has
regulations that require the disclosure of all hydraulic fracking chemicals used in oil and natural
gas wells drilled on federal property. However, many gas companies have exploited a flaw in the
regulations that state, the BLM would allow companies to exempt certain chemicals or mixtures
of compounds that are considered trade secrets (Song). This makes it hard for government

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agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency to enforce the rules set out by the Safe
Drinking Water Act of 1974. Dusty Horwitt, senior counsel at the Environmental Working
Group, a nonprofit that advocates for public health says, the trade secret exemptions could
potentially make the rules meaningless if applied broadly. If you know what's being injected,
you'd know what to monitor and track (Song). The loophole in the BLMs regulations allow
gas companies to keep certain chemicals secret if they think that revealing those chemicals will
harm their business. Scientists have a hard time detecting potentially dangerous chemicals in
fracking fluid when they know what they are looking for and will have an even harder time
trying to identify chemicals if they do not know what they are looking for. Gas companies are
taking advantage of the Bureau of Land Managements thoughtfulness and are using the loophole
to possibly damage the earth even more. The only way to stop further damage to the earth, the
practice of fracturing oil and gas wells must be stopped. Without fracking, the BLM will not
have to worry about not knowing what chemicals are being injected into the ground and
American citizens will not have to worry about chemicals from the fracking fluid seeping into
their water supply.
While fracking can cause pollution and present many unsettling issues, it may also result
in problems that will rock our world. United States Geological Service (USGS) geophysicist
William Ellsworth found in his study that, the spike in earthquakes since 2001 near oil and gas
extraction operations is almost certainly man-made (Horwitt and Formuzis).

After the

fracturing process is over, any wastewater is injected back into disposal wells in the ground.
United States Geological Service scientists have found that injections can induce seismicity by
changing pressure and adding lubrication along faults (Horwitt and Formuzis).

This is

especially alarming in earthquake prone states like California and Oklahoma. Increased seismic

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activity along the San Andreas Fault could result in devastating earthquakes that will cause
billions of dollars in damage. However, in Oklahoma, the consequences are already being felt.
According to EcoWatch, Oklahoma went from two earthquakes a year before 2009 to two a day.
This year, roughly 700 earthquakes of magnitude 3 or higher have shaken the state, compared to
20 in 2009 (Chow). This increase in the amount of earthquakes is disturbing because it is not
something usual. In order to prevent more frequent earthquakes, it is imperative that fracking be
banned. Without the addition pressure and lubrication on fault lines, it may be possible to
prevent such natural disasters from becoming an everyday occurrence.
Children are taught to respect each other and have compassion, but many people are not
caring for the Earth and are only concerned with their own self-interests. An ancient Indian
proverb states, Only when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last
fish been caught will we realize that we cannot eat money. In the gas industry, the Earth is often
neglected so that people can make more money. However, to protect the planet and future
generations, humanity must change the ways it produces energy. Rather than fracturing wells to
obtain access to more fossil fuels, scientists should be focused on finding more efficient
renewable energies. Although it is easier to continue on the current destructive path and change
nothing, preserving the environment and protecting the well being of people on this planet is
more important than paper bartering items that we call money. So, the gas industry must stop the
use of hydraulic fracturing, and lessen the impact of its devastating side effects on the earth in
order to sustain life on this planet for many years to come. Everyone on earth must act together
to ban the use of fracking and push for the research of renewable energies to help ensure a future
for this planet.

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Works Cited
Chow, Lorraine. Its Official: Oklahoma Experiences More Earthquakes Than Anywhere Else in
the World. Energy, Fracking, Fracking Wastewater. EcoWatch, 16 November 2015.
Web. 28 February 2016.
Clayton, Mark. American Rivers Must Be Protected from Fracking and Other Threats.
Pollution. Ed. Debra A. Miller. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2012. Current Controversies.
Rpt. from Controversial Path to Possible Glut of Natural Gas. Christian Science
Monitor. 2008. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Fracking: A Look Back. ASME.org. American Society of Mechanical Engineers. December
2012. Web. 20 February 2016.
Goldenberg, Suzanne. Fracking is depleting water supplies in America's driest areas. Fracking.
The Guardian. 5 February 2014. Web. 23 February 2016.
Horwitt, Dusty, and Alex Formuzis. Fracking Causes Seismic Instability and Earthquakes.
Fracking. Ed. Tamara Thompson. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2013. At Issue. Rpt. from
USGS: Recent Earthquakes Almost Certainly ManmadeReport Implicates Oil and
Natural Gas Drilling. 2012. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.
Hyder, Joseph P. Hydraulic fracturing. The Gale Encyclopedia of Science. Ed. K. Lee Lerner
and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner. 5th ed. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale, 2014. Student
Resources in Context. Web. 8 Feb. 2016.
Ingraffea,Anthony.FrackingIsNotSafe. NaturalGas.Ed.DedriaBryfonski.Farmington
Hills, MI: Greenhaven Press, 2015. Opposing Viewpoints. Rpt. from Dangers of
Hydraulic Fracturing in Shale. Casper Star Tribune (27 Oct. 2013). Opposing
ViewpointsinContext.Web.28Feb.2016.

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Murray, Ashley. PennEnviroment report finds hundreds of fracking operations near
Pennsylvania schools, day-care centers. Pittsburg City Paper. Pittsburg City Paper, 28
October 2015. Web. 28 February 2016.
Polson, Jim, and Jim Efstathiou. Fracking Pollutes the Air with Hazardous Chemicals.
Fracking. Ed. Tamara Thompson. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2013. At Issue. Rpt. from
Fracking Wells Air Emissions Pose Health Risks, Study Finds. 2012. Opposing
Viewpoints in Context. Web. 29 Feb. 2016.
Shooters A Fracking History. Petroleum Technology. American Oil and Gas Historical
Society, n.d. Web. 21 February 2016.
Song, Lisa. The Chemicals Used for Fracking Should Be Fully Disclosed. Fracking. Ed.
Tamara Thompson. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2013. At Issue. Rpt. from Secrecy
Loophole

Could

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http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20120215/blm-fracking-chemicals-disclosurehydraulic-fracturing-proprietary-natural-gas-drilling. 2012. Opposing Viewpoints in

Context. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.