Pros And Cons Of Hydraulic Fracturing

It is Time to Quit Frackin’ Around “Hydraulic Fracturing” has had adverse effects on the environment, the economy, and human life in general. Understanding these effects, and their imprint on the planet Earth and those therein will make things more clear. It is important to know how “fracking” works, and it will bring to light the good, the bad, and the ugly. The truth about fracking is that it is quickly becoming a nightmare for both the environment and humans alike, because there are not enough state or federal policies to help monitor and reduce the pollution it creates. During the second decade of this twenty-first century, the United States has discovered a new type of energy. It is affordable, it burns somewhat cleaner than

The second step, after reaching the shale rock formations, is to turn the drill bit horizontally and keep drilling. The lateral part of the borehole can be drilled as far as a mile, sometimes two. The third step is to ensure the borehole does not leak gas or wastewater into nearby groundwater. To do this, one lines the borehole with a steel casing, and then cement it in place so that it doesn’t move while hydrofracking. The fourth step is to use small explosives on the lateral section of the steel casing in order to punch small holes in it. This is achieved by detonating a small satchel of steel ball-bearings at the end of the pipe. The fifth step basically completes the whole process by pumping a “slurry” of water, sand, and chemicals into the borehole at extremely high pressures. Most of the time it reaches well over 9000 pounds of pressure per square inch. Once the pressurized slurry reaches the perforations at the end of the borehole, it cracks open the shale rock. Fracturing the rock, the shale gas is trapped inside tiny bubbles. Once the holes in the rock have been made, sand and “proppants” let the gas flow out. Proppants are chemicals and such, that help to hold open the fractures in the rock. These proppants

These are all things that have adverse effects on the environment and a couple of them promote global warming. Water pollution is a rather large and growing problem in the fracking industry, because there are so many chemical additives used in the drilling mud, slurries, and fluids. These chemicals are needed for the hydrofracking process. They have been known to seep into underground drinking wells and pollute nearby freshwater supplies. This is a growing problem due to there being over a million active gas wells in the United States currently (Loki). Methane pollution is one of the biggest problems the energy companies face. Methane is the central component in shale gas, and it has a climate-changing effect nearly 20 times larger than that of carbon dioxide, when measured over a century long period (Prud’homme). Methane migration occurs when methane migrates from hydrofracked wells into water wells and underground aquifers, then into the atmosphere. This is due to unsound cement well casings in the borehole. Hydraulic fracturing opponents have been