Fracking?

Fracking Fields in California. Photo by Blaine O'Neil

The EPA recently gave some new guidelines on the limit on fracking. They extended the deadline to create safer frack zones until 2015. Currently, the rules say that there is no need to make the wells emission friendly. Now, by 2015, drillers will have to create emission capture technology that will stop the pollutants from leaking into the air. The impacts of this are enormous. Fracking is a process in which drillers inject fluid into the ground to break up the rock deep in the earth. Once the bedrock is broken up, the natural gas begins flowing. Many proponents of natural gas (namely, the gas companies trying to project themselves as "eco-friendly"), say that natural gas is cleaner than oil, however, fracking makes the process dirtier than even oil. The only reason that gas companies support natural gas is because it is cheap and easy to harvest. Lobbyists for the energy companies have done everything they can to create bills like this one that help maintain the companies' monopoly on the energy market at the expense of our environment. The bill is allowing energy companies to not have to invest in better technology. This new bill will have devastating effects on the environment and needs to be stopped.

-John