Post by bushmanbilly on Jul 3, 2014 16:18:27 GMT -5
Another Study Finds Fracking Didn’t Contaminate Water
news.yahoo.com/another-study-finds-fracking-didn-t-contaminate-water-154210746.html
Tests and scientific experts have already claimed that many health and environmental concerns tied to hydraulic fracturing for natural gas, often voiced by opponents of the process, lack scientific backing. Now, yet another study has found that wells near fracking sites did not experience water contamination.
Duke University and members of the U.S. Geological Survey examined 127 drinking water wells for evidence of pollution from methane gas or chemicals. With more than 4,000 new gas wells drilled in Arkansas' Fayetteville Shale since 2004, researchers were looking for the presence of contamination from drilling, or from naturally occurring gas or ultra-salty liquids that seep up through pre-existing faults.
What they found was that Arkansas homeowners "typically had good water quality, regardless of whether they were near shale gas development," Robert Jackson, a professor of environmental sciences at Duke, said in a statement.
"Only a fraction of the groundwater samples we collected contained dissolved methane, mostly in low concentrations, and the isotopic fingerprint of the carbon in the methane in our samples was different from the carbon in deep shale gas in all but two cases," Avner Vengosh, professor of geochemistry and water quality at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment, said, according to the university's press release.
This would indicate that the methane resulted from biological activity not from shale gas contamination, Vengosh said.
news.yahoo.com/another-study-finds-fracking-didn-t-contaminate-water-154210746.html
Tests and scientific experts have already claimed that many health and environmental concerns tied to hydraulic fracturing for natural gas, often voiced by opponents of the process, lack scientific backing. Now, yet another study has found that wells near fracking sites did not experience water contamination.
Duke University and members of the U.S. Geological Survey examined 127 drinking water wells for evidence of pollution from methane gas or chemicals. With more than 4,000 new gas wells drilled in Arkansas' Fayetteville Shale since 2004, researchers were looking for the presence of contamination from drilling, or from naturally occurring gas or ultra-salty liquids that seep up through pre-existing faults.
What they found was that Arkansas homeowners "typically had good water quality, regardless of whether they were near shale gas development," Robert Jackson, a professor of environmental sciences at Duke, said in a statement.
"Only a fraction of the groundwater samples we collected contained dissolved methane, mostly in low concentrations, and the isotopic fingerprint of the carbon in the methane in our samples was different from the carbon in deep shale gas in all but two cases," Avner Vengosh, professor of geochemistry and water quality at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment, said, according to the university's press release.
This would indicate that the methane resulted from biological activity not from shale gas contamination, Vengosh said.