The extraction of natural gas has been a common trend in the United States. With the advancement in technology, a lot of types of machinery, cars, and other equipment have been designed, and all of them require the use of oil and gas. Hence, various companies have ventured in hydraulic fracking in the hope of producing more oil and gas. However, the hydraulic fracking itself brings environmental and health dangers.
This paper seeks to answer the following research questions:
1. What is hydraulic fracking?
2. What are the environment and health dangers of hydraulic fracking?
3. What solutions can be offered to reduce or eliminate the risks of hydraulic fracking?
Hydraulic fracking is a widespread method, particularly in the United States, because of the technological innovation that enabled extraction of natural gas from coal beds, tight sands, and different shale formations (Burton, et al., 2014). Initially, companies only used the hydraulic fracking technique. As years passed, this procedure was applied together with horizontal drilling. The collaborative procedures performed by these two techniques have made possible the production of gas. But the two procedures have increased the magnitude of impacts they bring on people’s health and environment. For instance, the area near the hydraulic fracking is often exposed to contamination in the drinking water. Residents are likely to experience gas emission exposure. Also, fracking instigates seismicity, and little tremors are recorded near fracking wells (Meng & Ashby, 2014). Moreover, people living near the area where drilling is performed are regularly exposed to air pollution, thereby aggravating the presence of certain illnesses, such as blood disorders, respiratory problems, cancer, and birth defects (Kiely, 2014).
Fracking benefits the United States economy a lot as this has become their only way to extract natural gas. Hydraulic fracking is also performed in South Africa. To decrease the quantity of water utilized in stimulating shale gas, foam technologies provide an alternative way. The use of these high-volume fracking methods also makes use of the high supply of water, aquifer contamination, methane infiltration, and surface footprint. To solve this issue, this paper proposes the use of new technologies such as non-toxic chemicals to eliminate or reduce water usage by decreasing the surface footprint. Also, the use of pipelines is also considered as a feasible method to reduce the adverse impacts of hydraulic fracking (Reible et al., 2016).
There have been series of oppositions to hydraulic fracking because of the exceedingly high quantities greenhouse gasses it emits. While the extraction of natural gas benefits a country’s economy tremendously, it is important to be mindful of the adverse impacts that the process brings. The people are the primary source of wealth, and if they get sick, the entire production process and work goals become unattainable.
References
Burton, G. A., Basu, N., Ellis, B. R., Kapo, K. E., Entrekin, S., & Nadelhoffer, K. (2014). Hydraulic “Fracking”: Are surface water impacts an ecological concern?. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, 33(8), 1679-1689.
Kiely, K. (2014). REPORT: Five Major Health Threats from Fracking-Related Air Pollution. NRDC. Retrieved 3 August 2016, from https://www.nrdc.org/media/2014/141216
Meng, Q., & Ashby, S. (2014). Distance: A critical aspect for environmental impact assessment of hydraulic fracking. The Extractive Industries and Society, 1(2), 124-126.
Reible, D. D., Honarparvar, S., Chen, C. C., Illangasekare, T. H., & MacDonell, M. (2016). Environmental Impacts of Hydraulic Fracturing. InEnvironmental Technology in the Oil Industry (pp. 199-219). Springer International Publishing.
