For decades, oil and gas industry executives as well as regulators have maintained that a drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, that is used for most natural gas wells has never contaminated underground drinking water.
DRILLING DOWN
A Tainted Water Well, and Concern There May Be More
By IAN URBINA
Published: August 3, 2011
Jim Wilson/The New York Times
Carla Greathouse is the author of a report that documents a case of drinking water contamination from fracking.
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Drilling Down
Contamination Worries
Articles in this series examine the risks of natural gas drilling and efforts to regulate this rapidly growing industry.
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Stephen Crowley/The New York Times
Rex W. Tillerson, the chief executive of ExxonMobil, has said that there are no reported cases of a freshwater aquifer having ever been contaminated from hydraulic fracturing.
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The claim is based in part on a simple fact: fracking, in which water and toxic chemicals are injected at high pressure into the ground to break up rocks and release the gas trapped there, occurs thousands of feet below drinking-water aquifers. Because of that distance, the drilling chemicals pose no risk, industry officials have argued.
“There have been over a million wells hydraulically fractured in the history of the industry, and there is not one, not one, reported case of a freshwater aquifer having ever been contaminated from hydraulic fracturing. Not one,” Rex W. Tillerson, the chief executive of ExxonMobil, said last year at a Congressional hearing on drilling.
It is a refrain that not only drilling proponents, but also state and federal lawmakers, even past and presentEnvironmental Protection Agency directors, have repeated often.
But there is in fact a documented case, and the E.P.A. report that discussed it suggests there may be more. Researchers, however, were unable to investigate many suspected cases because their details were sealed from the public when energy companies settled lawsuits with landowners.
Current and former E.P.A. officials say this practice continues to prevent them from fully assessing the risks of certain types of gas drilling.
“I still don’t understand why industry should be allowed to hide problems when public safety is at stake,” said Carla Greathouse, the author of the E.P.A. report that documents a case of drinking water contamination from fracking. “If it’s so safe, let the public review all the cases.”
Eric Wohlschlegel, a spokesman for the American Petroleum Institute, dismissed the assertion that sealed settlements have hidden problems with gas drilling, and he added that countless academic, federal and state investigators conducted extensive research on groundwater contamination issues, and have found that drinking water contamination from fracking is highly improbable.
“Settlements are sealed for a variety of reasons, are common in litigation, and are done at the request of both landowners and operators,” Mr. Wohlschlegel said.
Still, the documented E.P.A. case, which has gone largely unnoticed for decades, includes evidence that many industry representatives were aware of it and also fought the agency’s attempts to include other cases in the final study.
The report is not recent — it was published in 1987, and the contamination was discovered in 1984. Drilling technology and safeguards in well design have improved significantly since then. Nevertheless, the report does contradict what has emerged as a kind of mantra in the industry and in the government.
The report concluded that hydraulic fracturing fluids or gel used by the Kaiser Exploration and Mining Company contaminated a well roughly 600 feet away on the property of James Parsons in Jackson County, W.Va., referring to it as “Mr. Parson’s water well.”
“When fracturing the Kaiser gas well on Mr. James Parson’s property, fractures were created allowing migration of fracture fluid from the gas well to Mr. Parson’s water well,” according to the agency’s summary of the case. “This fracture fluid, along with natural gas was present in Mr. Parson’s water, rendering it unusable.”
Asked about the cause of the incident, Mr. Wohlschlegel emphasized that the important factor was that the driller and the regulator had not known about the nearby aquifer. But in comments submitted to the E.P.A. at the time about the report, the petroleum institute acknowledged that this was indeed a case of drinking water contamination from fracking.
“The damage here,” the institute wrote, referring to Mr. Parsons’ contaminated water well, “results from an accident or malfunction of the fracturing process.”
Mr. Wohlschlegel cautioned however that the comments provided at the time by the institute were not based on its own research and therefore it cannot be sure that other factors did not play a role.
In their report, E.P.A. officials also wrote that Mr. Parsons’ case was highlighted as an “illustrative” example of the hazards created by this type of drilling, and that legal settlements and nondisclosure agreements prevented access to scientific documentation of other incidents.
“This is typical practice, for instance, in Texas,” the report stated. “In some cases, the records of well-publicized damage incidents are almost entirely unavailable for review.”
Bipartisan federal legislation before Congress would require judges to consider public health and safety before sealing court records or approving settlement agreements.
this article appeared in print on August 4, 2011, on page A13 of the New York edition with the headline: A Tainted Water Well, And Concern There May Be More.
Hyderabad
23 August, 1976
Auckland, New Zealand
My Dear Tusta Krsna Maharaja,
Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter of 10 August 1976 and have noted the contents. Your idea and completion of the kirtana hall etc. is very nice. You can visit our farm projects at New Vrndavana and the New York Farm in Port Royal, Pennsylvania. They do everything very nicely and you can develop your farm on their model. That you are growing all your own grains is very good. It is my ambition that all devotees may remain self independent by producing vegetables, grains, milk, fruits, flowers, and by weaving their own cloth in handlooms. This simple life is very nice. Simple village life saves time for other engagements like chanting the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra.
Generally people are spoiling their lives for decorating the dead body and giving no attention at all to the spirit soul within. Our business is just the opposite, to give more time to the spiritual life and accept material necessities only as required. This makes life perfect. This is the Vedic way of life. We do not reject or accept anything until it is seen in the light of our Krsna Consciousness Movement. Anything favorable for Krsna consciousness we accept and anything unfavorable we reject, anukulasya sankalpah pratikulyam-vivarjanam.
Giving classes and holding feasts is our preaching. We should hold sankirtana as much as possible and distribute prasadam. Gradually when their heart is softened, then we will talk of philosophy, not in the beginning.
I have read your telegram of Vyasa Puja offering and I thank you very much for your nice feelings. I hope this meets you in good health.
Your ever well-wisher,
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
23 August, 1976
Auckland, New Zealand
My Dear Tusta Krsna Maharaja,
Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter of 10 August 1976 and have noted the contents. Your idea and completion of the kirtana hall etc. is very nice. You can visit our farm projects at New Vrndavana and the New York Farm in Port Royal, Pennsylvania. They do everything very nicely and you can develop your farm on their model. That you are growing all your own grains is very good. It is my ambition that all devotees may remain self independent by producing vegetables, grains, milk, fruits, flowers, and by weaving their own cloth in handlooms. This simple life is very nice. Simple village life saves time for other engagements like chanting the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra.
Generally people are spoiling their lives for decorating the dead body and giving no attention at all to the spirit soul within. Our business is just the opposite, to give more time to the spiritual life and accept material necessities only as required. This makes life perfect. This is the Vedic way of life. We do not reject or accept anything until it is seen in the light of our Krsna Consciousness Movement. Anything favorable for Krsna consciousness we accept and anything unfavorable we reject, anukulasya sankalpah pratikulyam-vivarjanam.
Giving classes and holding feasts is our preaching. We should hold sankirtana as much as possible and distribute prasadam. Gradually when their heart is softened, then we will talk of philosophy, not in the beginning.
I have read your telegram of Vyasa Puja offering and I thank you very much for your nice feelings. I hope this meets you in good health.
Your ever well-wisher,
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
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