Hydraulic fracturing (hydrofracking or fracking) is a process of pumping water, mixed with a fraction of a percent of chemicals, into wells at least 3,000 feet beneath the surface, considerably lower than the water tables.
Abundant natural gas obtained through hydrofracking has made alternate forms of energy increasingly irrelevant. The alternative known as ethanol uses more petroleum than it saves. Those squiggly light bulbs cost more, produce less light and the mercury inside makes them dangerous if broken. At the same time, there’s been a sharp decline in natural gas prices, thanks to the states that do allow fracking.
So why do some New York elected officials and candidates seeking election demonize fracking? Because those who worship the god of man-made global warming want us to use costlier alternatives. They want to create an artificial market for the alternatives by making fossil fuel more expensive on the false assumption it will save the planet.
DO YOU AGREE WITH BAZZO'S FRACKING OPINION OR SHOULD HE FRACK OFF? LET HIM KNOW BY CLICKING ON THE COMMENT BUTTON.
Furthermore, the USGS estimated there was 80% less reserves than reported by the industry - this may be a land grab and most are just too dumb to see it. Not the panacea most expect.
A couple of days after the BP Macondo well was capped, CNN put a girl reporter in a blimp to look for oil on the surface of the Gulf. She spent a day in the blimp and found no oil. The reaction to the BP spill was hysterical, especially by Governor Jindal. The anti-fracking comments in this stream are just ridiculous.
National Casualty (Insurance) Company, part of the Nationwide group of insurance companies with over $12 billion in assets, announces Hydraulic Fracturing Operations Prohibited: After months of research and discussion, we have determined that the exposures presented by hydraulic fracturing are too great to ignore. Risks involved with hydraulic fracturing are now prohibited for General Liability, Commercial Auto, Motor Truck Cargo, Auto Physical Damage and Public Auto (insurance) coverage. (We will) not bind risks with this exposure, and any policies currently written with this exposure (will) be non-renewed (following state requirements). Prohibited risks involved in fracking operations include, but are not limited to: Contractors involved in fracking operations; landowners whose land has been leased to lessees with fracking operations; Frack sand and frack liquid haulers; Water haulers — clean water, salt water or sludge; Hotshots — including hauling pipe/equipment, parts, site prep (dump trucks, bulldozers) or leasing of tanks; Oilfield support operations — hauling of pipe, lumber or equipment; Oilfield support operations — tankers, over the hole or non-owned trailers.
I wonder how ridiculous they'd seem if your business & livelihood were ruined.
Natural Gas is a very clean fuel to burn and we have an abundance of it, and it has become very cheap as of late. Factories and Power Plants are converting over from Coal to Gas, and this drives down the cost manufacturing goods which makes the more competitive, and can create jobs. The technology and the process of making these underground fractures needs to be improved so tha it will have little or no environmental impact. Until that time, no fracking should be allowed in New York. When you put these energy companies on notice they will get no revenue unless some safer practice is used, amazing things can happen.
http://www.nypost.com/p/blogs/capitol/the_truthland_about_gasland_ogG3RH5UbegJP33eajRdAO
Fracked gas also contains high levels of radioactive radon gas, the #1 cause of lung cancer among non-smokers. That'll be in you cellars and kitchens. Start imagining life in a more efficient house that is cheaper to live in. Google "Passive House" or "German Passive House," which was developed in Illinois but adopted in Germany. It's a house so efficiently and intelligently designed that it can be heated by the people and appliances within it.
"Natural gas" is methane, a greenhouse gas 20-40 times worse, molecule for molecule, than carbon dioxide, the #1 ghg. In order to keep high pressure gas pipelines from blowing up (which they do about once a week somewhere in the U.S. anyway), they vent the methane to the air. The best source of energy is not using it. Homes can be built so efficiently that they can be heated by the people and appliances within them. This was developed in Illinois in the '90s, called "the Passive House" and adopted in Germany so it's now called the "German Passive House." Google it. There are over 100 certified solar installers in NYC and Westchester, but most of them are for electricity. Solar thermal directly saves oil and gas, is cheaper and faster to install, and gives you free heat and hot water. Check the yellow pages. Plumbers can become certified solar thermal installers for a single course at a community college. We can get out of this bind we put ourselves into.
Solar is great on buildings, but to have a real solar house is a chemical storage cell nightmare, and wind is an environmental disaster in its own right But if you want to give me the 80,000 dolars to get me off the grid I'll take it, and unlike Clarkstown which is against creating green jobs, I'll higher local installers and not outsource to an Albany company who is going to put up workers in hotels and spend their wages outside of Rockland. ...
... I am saving for a dual axis 12 panel solar array for my back yard. I have taken a solar instalation course.
Fracking is far from ideal, but with good controls it can be acceptable. We need energy independence and we need it faster than the alternatives can be implemented.
How many people have been killed living so close to Indian Point.
Oil is dirty, expensive and unnecessary for heating yet an environmental group keeps people burning it. We have a domestic and clean resource in NY now, Natural gas. Western NY is full of it, we have our energy source for the next 90 years. In the mean time figure something better, not just an impossible utopian dream. Solar and wind are not reliable, efficient, or as clean as people say. ( I like solar as a supplement) And yea your right ,waste is dumped into neighborhood storm drains, and swimming pools, yea thats the ticket, scare everyone with unfounded lies. ...
In the mean time while the real geniuses of this world are working on this stuff, it is the job of the rest of us not to destroy the planet, but we can't even manage that because most of you are more concerned with paying an extra $20.00 a month on your electric bill than you are in leaving your children air to breath and water to drink.
Government's role should not be to compete with the private sector. And it should not begin a sort of "command " economic lurch. Government should highlight the issue and then clear the deck of as many roadblocks as is practical ... and let the market find a solution that is compatible with need and cost. it is NOT the role of government to micromanage the process ... only to facilitate the process. Most of the government's recent efforts to choose winners or losers in this regard have been failures because those ideas seem to be void of the most important element: they're not cost effective and, in many cases, practical. If it was truly doable ... we'd all have pocket energy gizmos at the ready. Unleash creativity and provide incentives and the problem will find lots of willing entrepreneurs. And they'll find solutions. The government has no such track record.
When a viable, cost-effective energy solution presents itself, well, it'll be embraced ... and private funding will do what it's always done: create a product or service that makes the old obsolete. That's been the cadence of mankind for time immemorial. My chips are on the private sector. They have a track record. Government does not.
service. By 1979, the possible sources of the contamination were traced to four nearby dry cleaning establishments discharging process liquids to septic systems. The County worked with the owners to correct the problems and to remove the sources. Maintenance activities at the nearby pumphouse also contributed to contamination in the aquifer. In addition, the area surrounding the well and pumphouse had been historically used for the disposal of street cleaning debris. The Katonah Municipal Well is part of the Bedford Water and Storage System. The original Katonah Municipal Well had supplied approximately 6,000 residents with water for domestic use.
Here's a great example of how to SPIN the facts: Report: frack uses 10X water per well than regular gas drilling; but, because wells are 30X more gas-productive, the statistic becomes, "far less water per unit of gas produced." Obviously an apologist for the industry, as are many here. Nevertheless, even this biased author has to admit, the treatment & disposal facilities are simply being overwhelmed-- a toxic backup for sure. About 80,000 gallons of water and chemicals are used in a each hydraulically fractured well-- and the incredible proliferation of wells-- thousands per PA county-- means ZILLIONS of gallons of the water that used to be drunk, fished from, or used for the lucrative tourist trade in the more pristine areas, now has to be DISPOSED of, with expensive treatment that YOU KNOW WHO is paying for (the gas cos. pay a mere token). The "fraction" of toxic chemicals is another spin. Would a billionth of a gram of arsenic make you feel any more safer?? The industry says these are merely chemicals found under any household's kitchen cabinet. OK-- would you want to drink those?? Once destroyed, a water resource is gone forever. A truly CONSERVATIVE approach would dictate erring on the sid of safety. roncepts