FRACKED WATER: Hydraulic fracturing requires millions of liters of water, and some way of coping with the dirty water that results.
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The nation's oil and gas wells produce at least nine billion liters of contaminated water per day, according to an Argonne National Laboratory report. And that is an underestimate of the amount of brine, fracking fluid and other contaminated water that flows back up a well along with the natural gas or oil, because it is based on incomplete data from state governments gathered in 2007.
The volume will only get larger, too: oil and gas producers use at least 7.5 million liters of water per well to fracture subterranean formations and release entrapped hydrocarbon fuels, a practice that has grown in the U.S. by at least 48 percent per year in the last five years, according to the Energy Information Administration. The rise is quickest in places such as the oil-bearing Bakken Formation in North Dakota or the natural gas-rich Marcellus Shale underlying parts of New York State, Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia.
The problem is that the large volumes of water that flow back to the surface along with the oil or gas are laced with everything from naturally radioactive minerals to proprietary chemicals. And there are not a lot of cost-effective options for treating it, other than dumping it down a deep well. But as certain states that are experiencing drought begin to restrict industrial water usage, fossil-fuel companies are experimenting with traditional and untraditional water treatment chemistries and technologies to try to clean this dirty water—or limit its use in the first place.
Recycling is not enough
The first option is to reuse wastewater in whatever ways possible. For fracking, "to the extent possible, fracturing fluid is recovered and recycled for reuse in future fracturing operations," says Reid Porter, a spokesman for the American Petroleum Institute, an industry group. "Recycling of flow-back water reduces demand for freshwater and reduces the need for disposal of wastewater."
But that water still has to be cleaned before it is reused, otherwise it loses the ability to do its subterranean dirty work. Simply dumping it improperly is not an option, because the high levels of salts and minerals will poison a river, stream or aquifer or it will render land incapable of supporting life for generations, like the salt pans of Utah or the ancient farm fields of Carthage salted by the Roman army. The cleansing technologies employed range from high-tech membranes that selectively filter out specific contaminants to the crude solution of boiling away the water, leaving scales of salts and other minerals behind on the walls of the boiler.
"Most of what we get out of the water are salts and a low-level of organics" (hydrocarbons and other contaminating carbon-based molecules), explains environmental engineer Steve Hopper, executive vice president of the industrial business group at Veolia Water, which is helping oil and gas companies cope with such "produced" water. "We have an example in California where we treated the water until it was so pure we had to add minerals back into it to be able to discharge it." The problem, thus far, has been cost, although Hopper argues Veolia's technologies add only "5 percent" to the cost of a given well.
A diversity of waters
To add to the challenge of sheer volume, the water produced by each oil and gas well is often different—with varying levels of acidity, saltiness or types of contaminants, whether dissolved hydrocarbons or heavy metals leached from the surrounding rock.
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41 Comments
Add CommentThis is simple. We just pipe the water to these pro frackers' homes and let them drink and bathe in it. The rest of us can have clean water and energy. Some new jobs might even be created with the pipe line placement. Everybody wins.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article states:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The most common solution, in the end, remains simply to inject the contaminated water down a disposal well that penetrates deeper than any drinking-water resources..."
"But this injected water is lost forever."
Well, forever is of course a very long time. I suspect that eventually even water pumped into deep disposal wells might find it's way back to the surface through normal geologic processes. Of course, that might not occur until long after humans have been eradicated (as early as late this century...)
I suggest that some alternative methods be developed to enable more complete extraction oil & gas and that, in any case, the current fracking methods be abandoned.
Steve926: Do you mean scale up the production of 'wind' and PVs by more than 2 orders of magnitude (and endure the even greater environmental disaster of those messy manufacturing processes, installation, maintenance, etc.?) (also, wind doesn't scale up - there's not enough energy there with causing major environmental disruption) Or are you talking about fantasy, self-congratulatory, weekend, wealthy showoff hobby greeners?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell, the "disaster" of wind and photovoltaics is far less than fossil fuel. Also there is geothermal, nuclear, and tidal to name a few. These products also have the benefit of recyclability at the end of their 20 -30 year life spans. Basically most U.S. can be energy producers. There is also the potential for cleaner nuclear energy and fusion is on the horizon. That's what I was talking about.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWere you talking about subsidizing industries that set continually record breaking profits at the expense for humanities future? You know, oil, gas and coal.
Fresh water reserves don't fit neatly in single municipalities or states. States sue each other frequently over water rights. Look at a map of the Ogalla aquifer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSteve926,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree with your direction, but geothermal and tidal also fall into the category of being at least 2 orders of magnitude too small right now, and neither of these can be scaled up to significant levels - there's just not enough energy there to extract. That leaves nuclear (at a minimum politically non-feasible) and fusion (perpetually '20 years away') Also, wind and PV do not have 20-30 year life spans. 10 years is a big stretch. It's like saying a car has a 30 year life span. I could be maintained that long, but no one would. I'm all for fossil fuel reduction/conversion, but it is best to begin at the beginning - where things are actually at. Not imagine that a sudden big change can be made. The effort will be perpetually sidelined if it is not realistic. Look at what happened with PV when tons of subsidies were thrown at it. Sadly, it would have been nearly as efficient to have burned the cash to power a turbine. Current wind technology is 2-5 years away from the same thing: Massive boondoggle projects that benefit only the manufacturers. Wait and see.
When fracking contaminants cross state lines, like in the article from PA to OH, that is a Federal trade issue not to be left up to State rights as dictated by our Constitution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlso, what the hell does it mean that the water was "too pure" that they needed to add minerals before disposing of it?
Ah yes, the elevator to the basement solution. Because naturally the states know more about this sort of thing. And when all of the crap dumped into the Allegheny flows into the Ohio and then to the Mississippi....and ends up as drinking water for folks in Louisiana....which state has responsibility?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRecent polling in Penn state shows nuke support close to 90% so nukes are very politically possible just not in California and Vermont. They are much cheaper than gas plant at the real cost of gas.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFracking gas delivered already costs close to $10/mcf so the cleaning process would just add more. The entire cheap gas scam is just Big Oil dumping gas to ensure that all new electrical generation and coal replacement is gas not nuclear.
Nope today's low gas price is Big Oil's long term plan to shut down its competition - nuke power.
China, a country run by engineers instead of lawyers, is investing in the nuke technology our corrupt politicians have abandoned are are on track to produce a 200 MW 1 cent a kwh Molten Salt Reactor based on the so successful developent at Oak Ridge 40 years ago.
Hopefully all those bought and paid for power utility exec's and regulators will doing jail time when 5 years from now gas prices hit world price and those gas power plant rates go up 500%.
"China, a country run by engineers instead of lawyers, is investing in the nuke technology our corrupt politicians..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUnless you can substantiate your statement, I contend that China is run by bureaucratic communist party administrators whose ability to corrupt is not challenged by any second political party. They are generally more corrupt than our own politicians, it's just that the parameters of their corruption are different.
From the comments on this article, I surmise that no one other than lampora has ever seen an oilfield operation let alone understand the physics of it. When you can tell me what a catwalk, a beaverslide, and a water table is or what weighted or inverted mud is, then you can lecture about fracking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe have been opening formations(probably another foreign word to you) for decades and yet you are still alive and not thirsty. This is not a new process. EPA standards are closely followed and there has been no successful case made about contaminated ground water.
The following is an ever-growing list of the individuals and families that have been harmed by fracking (or shale gas production) in the US.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://pennsylvaniaallianceforcleanwaterandair.wordpress.com/the-list/
When you can tell me what a catwalk, a beaverslide, and a water table is or what weighted or inverted mud is, then you can lecture about fracking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo let me get this straight, old timer, the only way real scientists can understand the problem is by first learning the nomenclature used by Texas rednecks whose main expertise in life is destruction of the environment, hauling a oily trailer from site to site and bathing in a bucket on Saturday afternoon so they smell a little better for the heifers at the local saloon?
OK, so I am being facetious, but really when does the reality set in that, just because you made your pile by fracking, it does not mean you are an environmentalist or a respected scientist?
To even suggest that fracking is done for any other reason then pure profit is ludicrous. That said, the industry will bend the rules anyway they can and in fact even go so far as to refuse to disclose just what exactly it is they are dumping into our environment and how they are doing it. If what they are doing is so safe, why the obfuscation and related BS?
You strike me as the kind of person that defended the practices that BP resorted to during the Gulf spill, which was injecting chemicals to cause the oil to sink where it would not be seen, but ended up contaminating the food chain from the bottom up instead.
All I can say is enjoy your gulf shrimp. I personally wouldn't touch it with your oil soaked gloves holding a ten foot pole.
Let's at least show some class here and explain why fracking is so safe, and how the industry is making every effort to ensure not one gram of polluted water is dumped where it shouldn't be. Don't just put down people because they are not a roughneck or an oil company shill. Some of us just aren't as easily indoctrinated by a company paid mouthpiece.
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Here is a real solution to to the disposal of billions of barrels of contaminated waste water. Outlaw the practice until a viable solution is found (which will never happen), and that goes for the mega-tons of other pollutants produced if the filthy water is reprocessed and dumped back into our rivers. Make people think twice before buying a 3 ton vehicle to haul their plastic bags full of Chinese junk home in.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHey, it was nice while it lasted, but we will never be able to go back to the days of 'Leave it to Beaver' or even 'Beavis and Butthead'. We have long since past the point of unlimited resources and most of us already know that fracking is just a short term solution that is not environmentally friendly no matter the propaganda. It will be stopped sooner or later because it is environmentally irresponsible and most folks aren't too stupid to see the obvious when it begins to affect their own back yard.
I say take all these people in the oil industry and put them to work for Chinese wages building environmentally friendly products that actually do cut down on waste and produce clean power.
Their children will appreciate it.
Okie Dokie. You apparently have never taken an earth science course in grade school. Oil, gas, water, in in your case, kool-aid are trapped in cavernous formations such as the Ten Sleep or Cretaceous never to escape. Drilling into these sands releases the resources trapped therein. We inject water into these sands to open them to increase flow. The hole drilled to reach the desirable zone is cased, that is pipe is lowered in the hole and cemented into place to prevent contamination into any other zone. This process is approved by the federal government and constantly monitored.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRetrieve water is collected and transported to mini refineries dedicated to extract any remaining oil by pushing it through vessels designed to separate out contaminates. The water is drinking pure.
In its infinite wisdom the feds do not allow the water to be use for wildlife or agriculture. Instead we are obliged to pump it down hole into a cavernous zone where it does no earthly good. Oh, well.
As a side note, I am appalled at how uninformed the readers of this magazine are. There are no "green" resources able to take the place of petroleum. We are not able to produce synthetics from wind power. That is to say the things you take for granted such as paint for your protest signs, the rain proof tent you occupy Wall Street in, or the plastic dash of your volkswagen microbus that transports you from sit in to sit in are all derived from petroleum. Without oil our lifestyle would crash in two weeks. Not a pretty thought.
Well, iamorpa, you seem to have it all figured out. Wish the rest of us were so darn smart. Yet, some of us, like me, actually work in energy and span both the clean, renewable and fossil fuel spaces. We, for better or worse, have to deal with the realities. And one of those realities is, that if we cannot soon figure out how to solve for water consumption and contamination in gas-fracking, that entire sector is going to fall like a house of cards and leave behind a stunning legacy of pollution. As to faith in nuclear, I would be all for it except for the resounding reality of the failure of Fukushima. Google search 'fukushima reactor 4,' browse a few of the recent articles and then try to convince the rest of us that we ought to sleep easy at night. And, finally, when it comes to cost, your estimates are far away from reality. The legacy tariff costs of nuclear alone are $0.07/kWh. These are costs extracted through taxes for subsidizing nuclear energy. Then, add to that the costs that the nuclear energy sector is extracting through rate payer commissions. Take a guess, smart guy. What do you think that number is?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSorry, could not go to your web site. Have any of these cases been brought to court or are they the uninformed and uneducated trying to make a buck? Interested how water pumped down hole into a contained formation though a nonporous conduit would contaminate h2o some hundred feet from the surface. All other claims have been found as fraudulent. How about yours?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou might want to learn the basics of Nuclear Energy before you make stupid comments about something you have no knowledge whatsoever.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour Big Oil disinformation dept has been FUD on Fuku Spent Fuel pool #4, despicable fear-mongering, a grand effort to earn another couple $trillion in increased LNG sales. Pure BS. The facts on Fuku Spent fuel:
ansnuclearcafe.org/2012/05/16/spent-fuel-at-fukushima-not-dangerous/
"...These articles are highly deceptive. The occurrence of a cataclysmic release of radioactive material as surmised is hinged upon the occurrence of so many statistically impossible events that it is certain to be a practical impossibility. Since the assertions continue to gain a wider audience, however, it is necessary to examine them and make a realistic assessment of their likelihood..."
Notice that the Big Oil Lackey's have no worries about the 20 LNG tanker loads that replace each NPP's Electricity output every year, each load is capable of destroying a city. No worries there. Notice the Big Oil sycophants never mention the Mud Volcano in Indonesia, caused by NG drilling that releases 6 million cubic feet of mud per day, causing the evacuation of 13,000 families already & a dozen deaths, homes buried forever, and is expected to continue for another 80 yrs. Hear any press about that? Nope - you haven't.
djysrv.blogspot.ca/2012/04/argh-debunking-some-nuclear-nonsense.html
"...The fuel is covered by 20 feet of water as a shield against radiation. It can remain in wet storage for15-20 years, or longer, but as a practical matter, can be safety transferred using remote handling cranes to dry storage casks as early as year five. U.S. nuclear utilities are increasingly moving their spent fuel to dry casks..."
atomicinsights.com/2012/05/nuclear-experts-crowd-source-detailed-response-to-fukushima-fuel-fable.html
"...In order for a cladding fire to occur the fuel must be recently discharged (about 10 to 180 days for a BWR and 30 to 250 days for a PWR)..."
Jct405 claims: "...The legacy tariff costs of nuclear alone are $0.07/kWh..."
More BS. You don't have a clue. Total cost of Nuclear Generation now, incl insurance, spent fuel storage & decommisisoning is 2 cents per kwh. Total Federal subsidies for Nuclear 1952-2006 was $65B in $2006 maybe 20% of that max relevant to commercial Nuclear Power. So $65B/10,270,633GWh = 0.63 cents per kwh. And ZIP after 2006. Not your invented 7 cents number.
www.misi-net.com/publications/2008energyincentives.pdf
nucleargreen.blogspot.ca/2008/09/energy-subsidies.html
Oh, a home rule and states' rights enthusiast, eh? The more local the level of control, the cheaper it is to bribe the regulators and politicians. Plus they tend to get intimidated by the deep pockets and threats of legal action from the industries you are suggesting they should be vested with regulating.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd that would be because anyone seeking relief for injuries received because of drilling contaminations are consistently required to sign non-disclosure agreements to obtain the relief. I think the burden of proof is on the industry to report how many non-disclosure agreements they have required aggrieved parties to sign.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLet's see, 9 billion litres of "produced" water per day, would be 2,377,807,133 gallons or 56,614,445.5 (42 gallon) barrels per day. The Veolia/PXP Plains Exploration and Production plant can process 45,000 barrels per day so it would take 1,258 plants of such capacity to handle the daily volume of contaminated water on a nation-wide basis. At up to $8.50 per barrel for just the costs of boiling the water that would come to $481,185,000 per day, if there was the capacity in place to do it. Almost half a billion dollars per day. Impressive. Consider the carbon footprints of what is being discussed and proposed here.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article still does not explain what happens to the constituents they say could be filtered out. Oh, yeah, they do deep well injection of the stuff and cause seismic activity in Ohio and Arkansas and other susceptible geologic formations. Let's just turn our pristine rural areas into Energy Sacrifice Zones. Have anyone been to West Virginia and Kentucky lately to see what mountain top removal for coal looks like and how many streams have had tailings dumped into them? What legacy do we leave behind for future generations?
I don't know who you think you are talking to, but it certainly not me Hoppy. You already lost the debate when you pulled the "You apparently have never taken an earth science course in grade school." card. You don't know sh*t about me or my education. Unqualified insults will get you nowhere.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs for your ridiculous statement that, "Retrieve water is collected and transported to mini refineries dedicated to extract any remaining oil by pushing it through vessels designed to separate out contaminates. The water is drinking pure.
In its infinite wisdom the feds do not allow the water to be use for wildlife or agriculture.", that is an outright lie. The feds don't want it dumped into the streams and rives because the greed mongers running your industry won't even disclose what is in the water in the first place.
Now you are going to claim it is safe to drink after straining it through an industrial cheesecloth? Is this supposed to be a joke or is it just a way to try to look smart because you really don't have a clue?
BTW, you wouldn't know a hippie from a yuppie if they had a label on their forehead. Just what do you goat ropers think an OWS protester is all about? Hippies were a culture movement that happened over 50 years ago. These kids today have absolutely nothing in common with them. Hippies were anti-materialism and the kids today are whining because they don't have a chance to get rich thanks to their jobs being shipped over seas and the jerks on the top think minimum wage is a living wage in America today. If they were hippies they would be happy to just drop out, join a commune and get back to nature. If you were actually sober back in the 60's then you would know that too.
It sounds to me like you are old enough to figure it out.
There is only one planet we can live on for all practical purposes. We either take care of it or we watch it die. It is all about intelligent choices.
The water is proven clean because it is tested. And the chemical process is far more complicated than running it through cheesecloth. I suggest you google the process and equipment before you launch into a tirade.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd thank you for diverting the conversation to lifestyles. This gives me the opportunity to point out to you how much of yours is dependent upon petroleum and oil. Again a good earth science course would have done this for me.
Never have been to the big city, I have deduced that is where you reside, I understand you heat your homes with fuel oil. I f not then electricity from coal or hydraulics. Your food is brought to you by truck or rail. Even your bike tires and the soles of your shoes are made of a synthetic derived of petroleum transformed with heat from coal. Your make up, I am assuming you are female, your push-up bra and those darling polyester pedal pushers are all brought to us by big oil. Hell, lady, you would not even have the device you are writing with.
Back to the point at hand, In three days your grocery store is empty with no hope of restocking. A mass migration is launched from Springfield, Ameytville, or wherever your parent's basement is, and you and a million others search for food. So much for the snail darter and the spotted owl and Bambi for that matter. Oh wait, you are going to grow an organic garden. On what land with what seed. You will starve waiting for produce. And no more make-up. Oh, dear. And no more glasses or contacts. No cell phone service. But you will have fleas.
Stop and think what your life would be without the natural resources you unwittingly depend on. Nobody wants dirty water or poor air quality. To think that is absurd. Why do you think a producer of any product wants to kill their customers? Every one is in it for the money, even your self. I again assume you go to work. If you are a student you are preparing to make money. We all do and will continue to do so.
And now a trip down memory lane...1968, what is the differnce between the riots at the Chicago democratic national convention and today's Okland or Chicago OWS?
Please dazzle me with facts instead of bumperstickers.
Have not been to a coal mine in Virginia, have been to ours. Big hole in the ground. Then the hole is reclaimed, that is rejuvenated, and grass grows on it and agriculture and wildlife thrive. tailings were put back in the hole. And God help anyone who lets a drop of anything get in the water. EPA, you know.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease, I would truly love to hear from somebody whose life has been put in jeopardy from contaminated ground water.
Your tally on money to operate and numbers of waste water sites is correct. Don't forget the building costs. It takes money to make money. And it takes more money to adhere to regulations, but well spent. Waste water is not boiled. Steam is not are friend when dealing with waste. Google the operation or better yet,visit a site. You will be welcome. As with steam, our imaginations are not our friends either. Good solid facts are. Hell, man, take a tour. See what is actually going on for your self instead of relying on someone else's opinion. Facts are magical. If you go and see, then you will be a scientific american.
oh, and by the way, SpaceX is not powered by lithium batteries.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYeah, yeah, but not relevant, unless you are some kind of Greenie Cultist, who actually believes (amazing as that may be) that Wind & Solar Pixie power can power a civilization. It can't.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe problem with your fossil fuels which supply 86% of the World's energy is they are running out, the newer sources are expensive to access and have a high EROEI, like the Tar Sands at 3:1, you can't power a civilization on a 3:1 or lower EROEI. Oil which is 34% and is already 10X the cost of Coal & NG in North America. That is not sustainable, with rapidly growing demand in the Developing World.
Chris Martenson: The Net Energy Cliff:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeBtdwPpTQM
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9b/Net_energy_cliff.gif
So we need to switch to Nuclear, which can easily replace all fossil fuels, including for fuels. It ain't difficult to make synthetic fuels from Coal/Biomass/Flu gas/Waste plus Nuclear Process Heat, Nuclear Electricity and Nuclear Hydrogen. You can make Methanol for under 13 cents per liter, and the Nobel Prize Winning Chemist, George Olah, showed how you can fuel an economy on Methanol - in his book, the Methanol Economy. France replaced half their Energy Supply with Nuclear in about 15 yrs, with archaic construction techniques, ancient control systems, and without factory construction or assembly line production.
Fossil Fuels are a class of Energy, as our Renewables and is Nuclear. Nuclear is a much greater class of energy than Renewable Energy or Fossil Fuels. Only Nuclear can work effectively 1) Underwater 2) in confined spaces 3) upper atmosphere 4) the Moon 5) anywhere in Outer Space and 6) remote places where transport of fuel is impractical, such as the Antarctic.
Fossil Fuels require a giant air intake to supply the huge quantities of oxygen they require. Renewables, except Hydro, have an energy density of < .06% of Nuclear. Nuclear is the big kid on the block, ready to take over from the children, when they finish playing.
To understand the harsh reality of Renewables and why they are not even REMOTELY CAPABLE OF REPLACING FOSSIL FUELS, see:
http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/10/18/tcase4/
Considering the frenzy to engage in this business and the resulting current spot price of Natural Gas, it would not be an unreasonable speculation that the true cost of clean-up is not fully reflected in the cost of opening and operating a fracking site. It's been well documented that Capitalism has problems with resource pricing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Feds do know whats in the water. The drillers have to regularly file reports with chemical analysis of the water.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe knee-jerk reaction to this industry is amazing. Five of the most rural counties in PA have under 5% unemployment. And you don't have to work a pad to benefit from the job opportunities. Did you stop driving your car when the Valdez leaked, or when the BP refinery caught on fire? The L/T benefits to gas production in the US are substantial enough. Your current alternative is to walk, and weave your own clothes from the cotton you grow yourself.
As said before, be quiet singing flea. No one needs your rabid anger here. It takes up space in a forum. Everyone knows your gutter-insult-filled tirades contain neither fact or elucidation. Seriously, be quiet.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWho made you a moderator? When did you ever address me in the past?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSometimes "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing", however, "more heads are better than one" is equally true. This is where comments by a combination of the general public, along with some real professionals that enter the comments, provide fertile soil for progress in the right direction. As dumb as a comment may sound, it is often the trigger that promotes progress in new thoughts and ideas. That helps to keep the world from being flat. Now, going to the subject at hand, I would imagine that a large number researchers, scientists, and engineers in the "fracking" field read these comments.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor over 40 years, the Feds have been extracting helium from natural gas and storing it in gigantic salt domes. Why? I have no scientificly sound idea. Does it relate to nuclear fusion? Perhaps. Were they planning on the use of lighter than air transportation at some point in the future? Maybe, however I suspect new technology has run past that idea. Could we stuff the unusable part of reclaimed fracking fluid into the salt domes until we find a practical use for it sometime in the future? We do know how to pass through the relatively thin underground clean water resources and go over two miles away the do the fracking and oil and gas retrieval. Our planet provides us with the energy and raw materials that we need to do, "what to many seems impossible" and continue to move forward in science.
Good, bad, or indifferent, I would like to see more futuristic thinkers enter their comments. As a professional futurist and contributing member of the World Future Society for quite a number of years, this group of "Professional Futurists" from around the world, representing a broad scope of professional futuring areas of interest have been responsible for triggering a large number of productive thoughts and ideas that have led to very profitable success in many areas of endeavor. They take knowledge of the past and blend it with the present to project into the future,what may very well become very workable and profitable new areas of work. These are the things that propel more studies and research. Frome this come the knowledge of the present, already blended with the past, and for the professional futurist, the material needed to project more new thoughts and ideas into the future. Comments from those who read the material presented, without prejudice, by this publication, in print and online, deserve more comments. There is much to be derived from "many heads sharing their thoughts and ideas". Pass the word to your science minded associates.
Here are my thoughts. While we continue to figure out ways to outlaw this disgusting greedo practice, we can sing:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTHE GAS-FRACKERS’ SONG OF JOY
by Bongobimbo
to the tune of “A-Hunting We Will Go”)
A-fracking they will go,
And watch their money grow!
Drill deep into Marcellus Shale,
A-fracking they will go!
So what if they pollute?
They just don’t give a hoot:
Making land and people frail
While bringing in the loot.
They pay a teensy tax.
Their payoffs won’t relax.
Our legislators love ‘em, and
The rich just love those hacks.
The chemicals they use,
Stay secret to confuse;
They make sure that we’ll never know
The chemicals they use!
You think they’ll hire you?
Oh no, they’ve got their crew
Who’ll come and mess up watersheds
And then say “Toodle-oo.”
When flames come from your tap,
It’s just a slight mishap,
They’ll take the profits, go away,
And you’re stuck with the crap.
There’s money in that murk,
A business masterwork!
You’d better never take a drink,
While they sit back and smirk.
Yes, it can make you ill,
Wherever gas rigs drill,
Your ponds and rivers die and stink,
But they won’t foot the bill!
In the water purification industry, clean water is hungry water--the more pure it is the more it grabs on to stuff; for example if you put distilled water into a soft plastic jug you are going to have more molecules of plastic in the water--I'm looking at you, distilled water for infants on the drugstore shelves.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPossibly this comment about having to add minerals to the water is somehow related to this phenomenon.
Hasn't the fracking process changed dramatically in the past 5-10 years? Some sources say that the old process wused 20,000 to 80,000 gallons of water to frack a well. The current high pressure fracking technique is reported to used 1 to 8 million gallons of water per frack and that each well is now fracked up to 18 times.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIsn't that why the Halliburton loophole was created?
Why are the gas drilling companies paying to have water delivered to residents near wells who water wells have become contaminated?
Synthetics? Two words: industrial hemp.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSynthetics? Two words: industrial hemp.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The Feds do know whats in the water. The drillers have to regularly file reports with chemical analysis of the water."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhich water--produce? Before or after treayment?
Which Feds? The EPA is not involved.
Clean water is hungry water. I suspect what they meant was that it was very pure distilled water and that would mean the water molecules would act aggressively, generally adhering to--I'm not a chemist--mineral molecules for example.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe geniuses in China are reportedly also gung-ho on fracking..
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisin southern IL there was an oil boom in the early 1980's before oil prices collapsed and well water that used to be good became contaminated.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNew fracking techniques in the past 15 years or so frack each well up to 18 times as opposed to once as was done 30 years ago, oh, and now each frack uses up to 1 million gallons and there are what, about 600 chemicals including benzene, not to mention heavy metals liberated from the earth in the process.
Also the EPA rules were changed with "the Halliburton loophole" thanks to Cheney's energy task force. No one is monitoring most of this drilling.
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