I did a little reasearch and ran across a few older articles about the fracking process and thought some here might find them interesting . Theres 3 articles and there a bit long . Sorry for the thread jack MD but I thought it was kinda related .
http://www.marcellus-shale.us/2005-Energy-Act.htm
Key paragraphs from the
ENERGY POLICY ACT OF 2005
SEC. 322. HYDRAULIC FRACTURING.
Paragraph (1) of section 1421(d) of the Safe Drinking Water Act (42 U.S.C. 300h(d)) is amended to read as follows:
‘‘(1) UNDERGROUND INJECTION.—The term ‘underground injection’—
‘‘(A) means the subsurface emplacement of fluids by well injection; and
‘‘(B) excludes—
‘‘(i) the underground injection of natural gas for purposes of storage; and
‘‘(ii) the underground injection of fluids or propping agents (other than diesel fuels) pursuant to hydraulic fracturing operations related to oil, gas, or geothermal production activities.’’.
SEC. 323. OIL AND GAS EXPLORATION AND PRODUCTION DEFINED.
Section 502 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (33 U.S.C. 1362) is amended by adding at the end the following:
‘‘(24) OIL AND GAS EXPLORATION AND PRODUCTION.—The term ‘oil and gas exploration, production, processing, or treatment operations or transmission facilities’ means all field activities or operations associated with exploration, production, processing, or treatment operations, or transmission facilities, including activities necessary to prepare a site for drilling and for the movement and placement of drilling equipment, whether or not such field activities or operations may be considered to be construction activities.’’.
'Fracking Convention' in Greene County, Pa.
Public Citizen’s Analysis of the Domenici-Barton Energy Policy Act of 2005
OIL & GAS REGULATORY ROLLBACKS
Section 322
"Exempts from the Safe Drinking Water Act a coalbed methane drilling technique called “hydraulic fracturing,” a potential polluter of underground drinking water. One of the largest companies employing this technique is Halliburton, for which Vice President Richard Cheney acted as chief executive officer in the 1990s. This exemption would kill lawsuits by Western ranchers who say that drilling for methane gas pollutes groundwater by injecting contaminated fluids underground. Only 16 companies stand to significantly benefit from this exemption from clean water laws: Anadarko, BP, Burlington Resources, ChevronTexaco, ConocoPhillips, Devon Energy, Dominion Resources, EOG Resources, Evergreen Resources, Halliburton, Marathon Oil, Oxbow (Gunnison Energy), Tom Brown, Western Gas Resources, Williams Cos and XTO. These companies gave nearly $15 million to federal candidates—with more than three-quarters of that total going to Republicans. Moreover, the 16 companies spent more than $70 million lobbying Congress.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/...-All-the-Chemicals-They-Use?via=sidebyuserrec
Leaked Congressional Report: Even 'Fracking' Companies Can't Identify All the Chemicals They Use
Last year the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, then chaired by Rep. Henry Waxman, undertook an investigation of the hydrofracking process companies use to pry natural gas from shale and other tight geological formations. Last night, media broke an embargo, so the committee released its
report two days ahead of the originally scheduled release on Monday.
One perspective on U.S. government archives
Written by Waxman, Rep. Edward Markey and Rep. Diana DeGette, the report is devastating. It puts an official imprimatur on what critics have been saying for a long time: Energy companies are engaging in reckless disregard for how fracking may affect the environment and human health, they themselves don't know all the chemicals they're using, and they are resisting effective regulation. But, as always, the question is what will be done about what the committee's investigators have reported. They themselves made no recommendations. Is their investigation headed, like so many government reports, for a shelf deep in some archive like that revealed in the final scenes of
Raiders of the Lost Ark? The crux of the report:
Between 2005 and 2009, the 14 oil and gas service companies used more than 2,500 hydraulic fracturing products containing 750 chemicals and other components. Overall, these companies used 780 million gallons of hydraulic fracturing products – not including water added at the well site – between 2005 and 2009. Some of the components used in the hydraulic fracturing products were common and generally harmless, such as salt and citric acid. Some were unexpected, such as instant coffee and walnut hulls. And some were extremely toxic, such as benzene and lead. Appendix A lists each of the 750 chemicals and other components used in hydraulic fracturing products between 2005 and 2009.
The most widely used chemical in hydraulic fracturing during this time period, as measured by the number of compounds containing the chemical, was methanol. Methanol, which was used in 342 hydraulic fracturing products, is a hazardous air pollutant and is on the candidate list for potential regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Some of the other most widely used chemicals were isopropyl alcohol (used in 274 products), 2-butoxyethanol (used in 126 products), and ethylene glycol (used in 119 products).
Between 2005 and 2009, the oil and gas service companies used hydraulic fracturing products containing 29 chemicals that are (1) known or possible human carcinogens, (2) regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act for their risks to human health, or (3) listed as hazardous air pollutants under the Clean Air Act. These 29 chemicals were components of more than 650 different products used in hydraulic fracturing.
The BTEX compounds – benzene, toluene, xylene, and ethylbenzene – appeared in 60 of the hydraulic fracturing products used between 2005 and 2009. Each BTEX compound is a regulated contaminant under the Safe Drinking Water Act and a hazardous air pollutant under the Clean Air Act. Benzene also is a known human carcinogen. The hydraulic fracturing companies injected 11.4 million gallons of products containing at least one BTEX chemical over the five year period.
In many instances, the oil and gas service companies were unable to provide the Committee with a complete chemical makeup of the hydraulic fracturing fluids they used. Between 2005 and 2009, the companies used 94 million gallons of 279 products that contained at least one chemical or component that the manufacturers deemed proprietary or a trade secret. Committee staff requested that these companies disclose this proprietary information. Although some companies did provide information about these proprietary fluids, in most cases the companies stated that they did not have access to proprietary information about products they purchased “off the shelf” from chemical suppliers. In these cases, the companies are injecting
fluids containing chemicals that they themselves cannot identify.
Let me repeat that:
Fluids containing chemicals that they themselves cannot identify.
And what is the industry's response? Not much so far. But Ian Urbina at
The New York Times wrote Saturday night:
Matt Armstrong, an energy attorney from Bracewell & Giuliani that represents several companies involved in natural gas drilling, faulted the methodology of the congressional report released Saturday and an earlier report by the same lawmakers. "This report uses the same sleight of hand deployed in the last report on diesel use -- it compiles overall product volumes, not the volumes of the hazardous chemicals contained within those products," he said. "This generates big numbers but provides no context for the use of these chemicals over the many thousands of frac jobs that were conducted within the timeframe of the report."
Here's some context. The Environmental Working Group reported in
Drilling Around the Law:
In a worst case scenario, the petroleum distillates used in a single well could contain enough benzene to contaminate more than 100 billion gallons of drinking water to unsafe levels, according to drilling company disclosures in New York State and published studies. (NYDEC DSGEIS 2009, Pagnotto 1961) That is more than 10 times as much water as the state of New York uses in a single day. (NYDEC DSGEIS 2009) Fracking has already been linked to drinking water contamination and property damage in Colorado, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wyoming and other states. (Lustgarten 2008a, 2008b)
Despite the risks, Congress in 2005 exempted hydraulic fracturing, except fracturing with diesel fuel, from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). Diesel is the only substance for which drillers must seek a permit before it is injected underground. (SDWA 2009)
Based on a six-month investigation of chemical disclosure records filed by several of the largest drilling corporations and interviews with regulators in five states, Environmental Working Group (EWG) found that:
1. Companies are injecting natural gas wells with millions of gallons of fracking fluids laced with petroleum distillates that can be similar to diesel and represent an equal or greater threat to water supplies. The distillates typically contain the same highly toxic chemicals as diesel: benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene. Distillates disclosed in records analyzed by EWG have been found to contain up to 93 times more benzene than diesel but require no authorization prior to use. ...
And that is just one of the
known toxic chemicals involved in fracking.
As Urbina writes, an EPA report on how fracking may be tainting drinking water "has been made more difficult by companies’ unwillingness to publicly disclose which chemicals and in what concentrations they are used." While the industry plans to start a public database of the chemicals, disclosure is voluntary and does not include the identity of those considered. Given the nature of voluntary reporting, there is no way to tell whether companies already skirting regulations will accurately report information about what chemicals they are using and in what amounts.
Last week, there was another leaked
report on fracking. This one was written by Robert W. Howarth, Renee Santoro and Anthony Ingraffea of Cornell University. They put an arrow through the heart of the argument that natural gas pried from tight formations will make a huge difference in the amount of CO2 emissions compared with the coal that advocates have touted it as being a replacement for:
“The greenhouse gas footprint for shale gas is greater than that for conventional gas or oil when viewed on any time horizon, but particularly so over 20 years. Compared to coal, the footprint of shale gas is at least 20% greater and perhaps more than twice as great on the 20-year horizon and is comparable when compared over 100 years… These methane emissions are at least 30% more than and perhaps more than twice as great as those from conventional gas. The higher emissions from shale gas occur at the time wells are hydraulically fractured -- as methane escapes from flow-back return fluids -- and during drill out following the fracturing.”
Since Ronald Reagan gutted research into renewable energy 30 years ago, the United States has been captive to fossil-fuel interests who have done all they can to prevent a full-bore effort dedicated to conservation, improved efficiency and renewables. These days, the focus is on domestic drilling on- and off-shore, production from tar sands, other environment-wrecking "unconventional" sources of oil and natural gas and the chimera of clean coal.
In Congress, Republicans have, of course, been the tip of the spear for this push while sneering and sniping at alternative approaches. But too many Democrats, coal-state Democrats mostly, but others as well, have neither put up obstacles to the fossil-fuel giants nor vigorously supported renewable alternatives. To its credit, the Obama administration has focused more attention on, and provided more funding for, renewables than any administration since Jimmy Carter's. The President's recent speech on energy included some additional indication that this support and funding will continue. But it also gave succor to the fossil-fuel industry, to the deep-water drillers, to clean-coal advocates and to those who say natural gas will rescue us. Down that path is a dead-end.
Persuading Congresspeople, including many members who are progressives except when it comes to energy matters, that they should take a fresh approach is no easy matter. Energy companies fill so many of their pockets with campaign cash. And even those not beholden in that way worry about the jobs associated with the industry, a legitimate concern for both them and us. So persuasion is a step-by-step process. We can press it forward by opening their eyes with documents like the Waxman-Markey-DeGette fracking report and with other studies, such as the recently published
A Solar Transition is Possible by Peter D. Schwartzman & David W. Schwartzman.
Of course, persuasion often requires other action as well, from lawsuits to peaceful but not passive confrontation on the front lines.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/5/20/733374/-Close-the-Halliburton-Loophole
Congress Should Close the Halliburton Loophole
Hydraulic fracturing should be regulated under the
Safe Drinking Water Act
Only one industry in the U. S. can legally inject known toxins directly into sources of drinking water without federal regulation, but as early as
this week, legislation may be introduced in Congress to overturn the exemption granted to Big Oil by the 2005 Congress at the urging of
Dick Cheney, former Halliburton CEO
Hydraulic fracturing (
FRACKing) is a technique that was developed by Halliburton. Millions of gallons of fresh water, mixed with sand, and often containing a
witch’s brew of cancer-causing and toxic chemicals are injected under high pressure miles down the drilling hole to fracture the underground formation and release the oil and gas trapped within.
Ninety percent of all U.S. oil and gas wells undergo hydraulic fracturing to stimulate the production of oil and gas.
These chemicals can be lethal! Last month
16 cattle died a gruesome death when a spill of hydraulic fracturing fluid landed in their pasture.
Yesterday, EPA Administrator
Lisa Jackson told Hinchey that she believed her agency should review the risk that fracturing poses to drinking water in light of various cases across the country that raise questions about the safety. Some of those cases are detailed in a 2 page hydraulic fracturing
FACT SHEET developed by
Earthjustice,
Natural Resources Defense Council,
Oil and Gas Accountability Project and
Western Organization of Resource Councils to help counter
Big Oil’s 14 page "Response to Allegations" document sent to our Congress Members.
The following key points from the fact sheet prove
there is no legitimate reason to keep this exemption:
Closing the Halliburton Loophole would not shut down drilling or mandate a burdensome new permit process.
Closing the Halliburton Loophole would not require disclosure of proprietary trade secrets or confidential business information.
Closing the Halliburton Loophole would provide a minimum federal standard to prohibit drinking water contamination and shine a light on hydraulic fracturing.
The domestic drilling agenda has expanded the number of U.S. wells enormously. There are already hundreds of thousands of wells in 34 states from New York to California, and hundreds of thousands of more wells are anticipated—each one involving the use of toxic chemicals.