Fracking Has Had No ‘Widespread’ Impact on Drinking Water, EPA Finds
‘Potential vulnerabilities’ should be addressed to prevent water contamination, EPA says after four-year study
A four-year study from
the EPA—the federal government’s most comprehensive examination of the
issue of fracking and drinking water—found that fracking can be carried
out safely and doesn’t need to pose a threat to water.
Photo:
Andrew Cullen/Reuters
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency—after a four-year study that is the U.S. government’s most comprehensive examination of the issue to date—concluded that hydraulic fracturing, as being carried out by industry and regulated by states, isn't having “widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water.”
However, EPA said there were a small number of contaminated drinking wells and highlighted potential vulnerabilities, including the disposal of wastewater and construction of durable wells.
The report was issued nearly a decade since fracking began helping unlock vast reserves of oil and natural gas across the U.S. It also bolsters the position staked out by the energy industry and its supporters: that fracking can be carried out safely.
“Hydraulic fracturing activities in the U.S. are carried out in a way that have not led to widespread, systematic impact on drinking water resources,” said Thomas Burke, deputy assistant administrator of the EPA’s office of research and development, on Thursday. “In fact, the number of documented impacts to drinking water is relatively low when compared to the number of fractured wells.”
Rob Jackson, an earth sciences professor at Stanford University who has published several papers on the environmental impacts of fracking, said he generally agrees with agency, although he hoped its report would be more comprehensive.
“The major conclusion is that water contamination isn’t widespread, and I think that is reasonable,” he said.
While the EPA report doesn’t recommend any specific action, it is already reinvigorating a yearslong debate over the role of fracking in the nation’s energy landscape. It also comes at a time when environmentalists have increasingly called to ban the practice outright, a step that two states with natural-gas resources—New York and Maryland—recently took.
Energy companies and most Republicans said the report confirmed fracking is being done safely, while environmentalists and some Democratic lawmakers cited the report’s reference to contaminated wells as proof fracking is bad for the environment.
Fracking is a process where water, chemicals and sand are pumped down a well under intense pressure to split open dense rocks and release the oil and gas trapped underground. Dozens of wells are fractured daily, using 1.5 million gallons on average, the EPA report said. Fracked wells also produce enough wastewater, which needs to be treated and disposed of properly, to cover the island of Manhattan under 100 feet of water annually, according to an article where Mr. Jackson was lead author.
Beginning around 2009 and 2010, opposition to fracking centered on the use of chemical-laced water and the potential to contaminate drinking water aquifers. Extensive scientific work on the subject—and the EPA study—haven't borne out the worst of those fears.
Fracking remains controversial in many communities. Some critics now focus less on water contamination and more on other concerns, including air emissions related to climate change, community health impacts and the proliferation of earthquakes that some studies have tied to injecting fracking wastewater.
In the late 1990s, the industry began using fracking to extract energy from a shale formation in Texas—the first tentative steps in what became the continuing energy boom unleashed by the extraction technique. Within a few years, fracking moved into Pennsylvania, and opposition to it has grown.
At first, protests centered on fear that fracking would lead to contaminated drinking water. Many of these fears were stoked by the 2010 documentary titled “Gasland.” One of the most notable scenes showed a landowner lighting his faucet on fire. In response such concerns, Congress, in 2010, ordered the EPA to conduct a major assessment of fracking and water.
On a conference call discussing that report Thursday, Mr. Burke, the EPA official, said the report’s purpose wasn’t to affirm whether fracking was safe or not.
“It’s not a question of safe or unsafe,” he said. “It’s a question of understanding vulnerabilities so we can address those vulnerabilities and practice hydraulic fracturing in the safest possible way.”
Environmentalists pointed to a line in the report that said EPA’s findings on fracking and drinking water may be subject to limiting factors, such as insufficient data.
“How can the EPA say there are no widespread impacts if they didn’t study this on a widespread basis?” said Josh Fox, director of “Gasland.”
Other environmentalists, who have worked with the oil and natural-gas industry to ensure fracking was done safely, raised other concerns.
Mark Brownstein, head of the climate and energy program for the Environmental Defense Fund, said he worried “industry will use this study as the conclusion of a process, rather than the start.” He said aging wells and handling enormous volumes of wastewater are both evolving issues. “Relentless focus on these issues by regulators and industry is critical,” he said.
Meanwhile, the energy industry hailed the resulting EPA report as proof that fracking could deliver an energy and economic boom without creating an environmental catastrophe.
“After more than five years and millions of dollars, the evidence gathered by EPA confirms what the agency has already acknowledged and what the oil and gas industry has known,” said Erik Milito, an executive with the American Petroleum Institute. “Hydraulic fracturing is being done safely under the strong environmental stewardship of state regulators and industry best practices.”
In Congress recently, the political debate over fracking has subsided. Almost all Republicans endorse fracking, and many Democratic lawmakers have increasingly been supportive as it has brought economic growth to a number of districts.
The study, which was released in draft form Thursday, will become final after a review by EPA’s Science Advisory Board and public input, which will occur later this year.
Christie Craddick—chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates oil and gas development—said the EPA report confirmed what was already known. “Economic development and environmental safety can and do exist peacefully,” she said.
