Fraccing works incredibly well for both gas and (fiscally more important) oil production. Major plays in south-central Texas had massive reserves previously untapped until oil-fraccing became viable.
A lot of the environmental concerns behind fraccing are bad business practices by those companies (as seen in Gasland), any ground water contaminated by gas is due to the irresponsibility of the company drilling and producing in those areas. As far as oil fraccing goes, it contains the same environmental threats as gas fraccing primarily because gas comes up with the oil. However, at least in Texas, oil fraccing usually occurs so deep that ground water contamination is substantially less threatening (safety regulations by the RRC and the company help preserve this).
A concern NOT brought up by Gasland or anyone who has a shitclue about fraccing is the possible long-term consequences of breaking up hundreds of thousands of acres of shale and limestone thousands of feet beneath the earth's surface. Wastewater fraccing in Arkansas is beginning to develop correlations between micro-tremors and injection wells. There is no substantial data to prove these practices will lead to anything particularly harmful, however an understanding of geology and geomorphology could lead one to believe that harmful seismic activity will result from this.
Deanicus67 karma
Gasland is a pisspoor documentary.
Fraccing works incredibly well for both gas and (fiscally more important) oil production. Major plays in south-central Texas had massive reserves previously untapped until oil-fraccing became viable.
A lot of the environmental concerns behind fraccing are bad business practices by those companies (as seen in Gasland), any ground water contaminated by gas is due to the irresponsibility of the company drilling and producing in those areas. As far as oil fraccing goes, it contains the same environmental threats as gas fraccing primarily because gas comes up with the oil. However, at least in Texas, oil fraccing usually occurs so deep that ground water contamination is substantially less threatening (safety regulations by the RRC and the company help preserve this).
A concern NOT brought up by Gasland or anyone who has a shitclue about fraccing is the possible long-term consequences of breaking up hundreds of thousands of acres of shale and limestone thousands of feet beneath the earth's surface. Wastewater fraccing in Arkansas is beginning to develop correlations between micro-tremors and injection wells. There is no substantial data to prove these practices will lead to anything particularly harmful, however an understanding of geology and geomorphology could lead one to believe that harmful seismic activity will result from this.
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