New Regs Ignore Fact Fracking Doesn't Taint Well Water

Energy: New federal regulations on fracking on public land ignore a study documenting that methane found in well water is unrelated to the location of hydraulically fractured oil and gas wells.

When the Obama administration recently released its new regulations on fracking — regulations that it said were needed to keep up with the advance and success of the decades-old technology to meet public safety needs — the Independent Petroleum Association of America and Western Energy Alliance immediately filed suit, saying that the new regs were based on "unsubstantiated concerns" that lacked any scientific basis.

"Hydraulic fracturing has been conducted safely and responsibly in the United States for over 60 years," noted IPAA president Barry Russell, who also pointed out the impact of the new regulations on job and economic growth. Fracking has produced an oil and natural gas boom, making them energy sources of the future, not the past.

The Obama administration doesn't like fracking and wishes that fracking would just go away so it can go on subsidizing the Solyndras of the world. But Russell is right: Fracking is safe, and the new study proves that any concerns are politically motivated fear-mongering.

Published online in late March in Environmental Science and Technology, the study focused on 11,309 drinking wells in northeastern Pennsylvania. It found that background levels of methane in well water are unrelated to the...


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