Hydraulic Fracking

In today’s economy, natural gas and oil are used for energy, to heat and cool homes and provides fuel for cooking. Fossil fuel companies developed a process for natural gas called hydraulic fracturing. Hydraulic fracturing has become the most used technique in the United States’ to produce oil and natural gas. Hydraulic fracturing is also knows as fracking is a technique to produce natural gas and oil. Wells are built which involves the injection of water, sand and chemicals at high pressure into bedrock to produce natural gas and oil. The process creates small cracks or fractures in rock formations. The initiative of hydraulic fracturing will create jobs, the ability to produce natural gas and oil, and for the United States to be less dependent
on imported energy. However, hydraulic fracturing had brought out a huge controversy about the ethics, concern of the environmental impact of water quality, air quality, earthquakes and health hazard. The process of hydraulic fracturing requires large amounts of water to drill and extract the natural gas and oil from the rocks.
The water is mixed with sand and chemicals to pump at high pressure into the shale rock. According to U.S Geological Survey (USGS) “This process is intended to create new fractures in the rock as well as increase the size, extend, and connectivity of existing permeability rocks like tight sandstone, shale, and some coal beds to increase oil and/or gas flow to a well from petroleum bearing rock formations”. The shale rocks contain the oil and gas. The shale rock will fracture from the fracturing fluid, which will hold the crack open and allow the natural gas to flow from the rock formation to the
well. Since the very beginning this initiative had raised several important issues regarding the environment and impact heath issues. This question had brought out a huge controversy about how hydraulic fracturing should be processed. There are important issues that hydraulic fracturing has brought which centers around the economy, the ability of the United States to produce more gas and oil and its environment impacted. Supporter of hydraulic fracturing believes this will help the economic growth in the United States, although the process of hydraulic fracturing can harm the environment and human health. Everything has to be taken into consideration to see if the benefit outweighs the risks. The process of hydraulic fracturing is dangerous or cause problems in the environment. This presents many ethical problems because it may affect the environment and human health risk because the chemicals used are harmful to humans and the environment. People fear that hydraulic fracturing will contaminate the groundwater and impact the water usage. The concern of fracturing is the high water consumption needed and how it can contaminate ground water. According to the USGS the “Oil and gas formations often contain significant amounts of water that come up with petroleum: this is referred to as produced water. Produce waters contain dissolved trace minerals from their formation origin”. The produce water is an environmental health concern because the water contains the chemical can affect the surface and groundwater quality. The purpose of the study is to examine “how radioactivity concentrations of naturally occurring radionuclides and their decay products change over time at a wastewater treatment facility that handles unconventional drilling waste” (Konkel, 2015) affect the environment and human health is who living or work near hydraulic fracturing sites. The water used for fracturing also return to the surface as flow water. During this process, the chemical will affect the surface, contaminate groundwater aquifers and impact the environment. According to Howarth and Ingraffea (2011) the contaminated drinking water is a health hazard to the public. The large amount of fresh water consumption can harm the environment by draining the water supplies. Howarth and Ingraffea states “contamination can happen through blowouts, surface spills from storage facilities, or improper disposal of fracking fluids”. The contamination of flow water is because to the chemicals added to the fracking fluid. The process of hydraulic fracturing uses a large amount of water; the chemical uses will contaminate groundwater and drinking water. Hydraulic fracturing will harm the environment and health risk that can be avoided if we stop fracturing of natural gas sources. The contaminated water will cause hazardous health risks. Companies are not required to disclose what chemicals are used. Many of the chemicals uses in the fracking fluids are toxic and will caused health risks. Researchers have also shown that air quality is also affected during the drilling process because of the “increase in emissions of methane, volatile organic compounds (VOC) and hazardous air pollutant (HAP)”(EPA, 2015).
During the process of hydraulic fracturing, the equipment used for drilling releases methane emissions. The EPA and other federal agencies are finding new technologies to reduce methane emissions. However, during the process of hydraulic fracturing the equipment used for drilling releases methane emissions. Methane is the most toxic greenhouse gas. According to Finkel and Hay, Volatile organic compounds and diesel particulate matter, for example, result in elevated air pollution concentrations that exceed US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) guidelines for both carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health risks” (p.
1). The public also fears hydraulic fracturing can cause earthquakes because of injecting and removal of fracturing fluid. According to the USGS “research that associates deepwell fluid injection, a process sometimes used to dispose of producing waters or flowback waters from hydraulic fracturing and gas production, with the triggering of earthquakes”. This can cause earthquakes because of the large amount of water being injected underground. Produce water is created because of deep well injection and can stop earthquakes because the water will be injected underground. Howarth and Ingraffea state “methane is a potent greenhouse gas, so even small emissions matter. Over a 20 year time period, the greenhouse gas footprint of shale gas is worse than that for coal or oil” (p. 272). Hydraulic fracturing is intended for the United States to increase its natural gas and oil production. During this century, natural gas and oil has become some of the most used energy in the United States. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an agency that sets the standards and regulations of hydraulic fracturing. Their goals are to “help ensure that natural gas extraction does not come at the expense of public health and the environment. The Agency’s focus and obligations under the law are to provide oversight, guidance and, where appropriate, rulemaking that achieve the best possible protections for the air, water and land where Americans live, work and play”. They do this by setting regulations to improve health and environmental safeties from the process of fracturing. They also help with the development and research on recycling of wastewater and how fracturing impacts the air quality. Hydraulic fracturing is intended for the United States to process its energy source. This will encourage economic growth. It is obvious that the issue dealing with our environment is endless. Hydraulic fracturing has changed our environment tremendously. Many argue that it will take away the quality of air and water system and they believe we should not be involved with the process of hydraulic fracturing. This topic is a very controversial issue. Hydraulic fracturing can be quite dangerous and is not the root source to benefit and encourage economic growth for natural gas and oil and to become successful. Overall, hydraulic fracturing will have negative impacts on our natural resources and will harm the environment. We need to look towards new environmentally method of retrieving energy resources such as wind and solar power.