Fracked gas in populated areas increases disease vastly

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webbie

Seasoned Moderator
Nov 17, 2005
12,165
Western Mass.
This is somewhat troubling:
http://www.erierising.com/human-hea...ment-of-unconventional-natural-gas-resources/

Basically, it says that those living within a 1/2 mile (that means a one mile circle with the gas well in the center) are subject to vastly more cancers and other diseases. Because of the way cancer and other diseases work, those further away also will have more problems, but they are harder to measure - and also cumulative.

Clean does not always mean clean. I am of the opinion that someday - and maybe even now - they would be able to extract this gas in a cleaner fashion, but why do so when they don't have to?
 
I think the industry is banking on the fact that a lot of health issues will take years if not decades to appear. By then it's someone else's problem.
 
That's pretty typical with most of these deals - unfortunately!
It is amazing that "freedom" and "property rights" include the ability to give people vastly more disease and not pay for it.....that is, if it can be paid for at all.

As I said above, I suspect there are ways to do it all cleaner - but, obviously, that means less quick profit.
 
Lots of hype.
I should be infested with cancer if this is true. I counted the wells within a mile of my home awhile back. Don't remember the exact number but I think it was just under 20.
The majority of the wells here were fraced 20-40 years ago.
Look at the maps and guess what county I live in.

http://andyarthur.org/maps/gas.html
 
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Lee, stats like that cannot be traced to cancer clusters and stuff like that. People are too mobile (they move) and too many other factors come into play - but the study is solid. The sampling picked up 5X as many VOC's and other such things in that radius.

I'm sure it could just as bad 1/4 mile downwind from most auto body shops also....but they aren't throwing in tens of thousands more of those and they have not excused them from the clean air standards (as they have with fracking chemicals).

Hey, if there is nothing wrong and nothing to hide - then we should all agree that high standards should pertain - right?
 
The guy who is going to mill my walnut logs on Monday afternoon (was supposed to be today but the rain screwed that up) is an local engineer who works for a machine company that sells a lot of drilling equipment, not only to the mining industry but other industries as well. We were talking about this very subject the other evening when he came down to check out my walnut logs. Long story short, he said he too was very skeptical of the adverse side effects of mining, after visiting many of those operations already he said that most of them are maintaining a very high mark of safety as far as health concerns. Now I am not saying I agree with the whole frack mining thing, I personally think it is bad for the environment (both above ground and below ground). It's hard to say, there are so many different things in the atmosphere (look at Japan's tsunami and the nuclear crap in the atmosphere from that tragedy).
 
Lots of hype.
I should be infested with cancer if this is true. I counted the wells within a mile of my home awhile back. Don't remember the exact number but I think it was just under 20.
The majority of the wells here were fraced 20-40 years ago.
Look at the maps and guess what county I live in.

http://andyarthur.org/maps/gas.html

I thought this was recent technology from the late 90's. Were they fracking gas wells in your area 20-40 yrs ago?
 
I thought this was recent technology from the late 90's. Were they fracking gas wells in your area 20-40 yrs ago?
YEP! They've actually been fracing longer than 40 years.
The horizontal part is new but the chemicals are still the same.
Hell, we have oil at 700-1800 feet and gas at 1800-5000. MUCH closer to the surface than the horizontal wells being drilled in PA. Our gas/oil is in Medina (a very porous non gas producing sandstone) not shale and many times easier to frac. If there were going to be problems with fracing , gas migration, and polution it wood have been here 20-40 years ago when the drilling boom was on like donkey kong and there was little regs. Like I've said before settling ponds were pumped free of water and the solids were buried on site at all these wells 20-40 years ago. Today it is landfilled.
 
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It often takes about 30-40 years of exposure for cancers to develop. Your area would be an interesting one to study.
 
Natural gas good; fracturing bad.
Seriously, as long as we are modifying subsurface conditions with high pressure fracturing we risk contamination of our ground water supplies.
Once they're contaminated that's it.
We'll need to weigh the benefits of getting more natural gas to burn with the potential very long term destruction of fresh water supplies.
Just one more argument for concentrating our efforts on renewables instead of fossil fuels.
 
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It often takes about 30-40 years of exposure for cancers to develop. Your area would be an interesting one to study.

That's a long time. I'm ambigious about the fracking (seeing how far away I am) but 30-40 years seems like ultra-low levels of exposure, like less than gas station levels. My only complaint is their exclusion from the clean air/water laws. Nothing to worry about should mean nothing to hide.

What exactly is "vastly" more cancers? I didn't read very closely but from what I gather its:

"Cumulative cancer risks were 10 in a million and 6 in a million for residents living ≤ ½ mile and > ½ mile from wells, respectively, with benzene as the major contributor to the risk."

So an extra 16 people in a million are going to get cancer? I'll roll the dice for a check every month, cuz I sure as chit ain't gonna stop drinking or eating red meat. Back that truck up and drill in my living room!
 
They have been punching gas wells in yards all over Fort Worth. And the air quality in the city has gone to hell.
 
I was born In Westen PA and some of those wells are 50 years plus most a lot newer, If you think the stat are bad on Marcellus wells just wait till you see Utica shale wells, they have abandoned Marcellus for Utica in the region I was born Alot higher yeilding and suprisingly Dirtier, thay are aftre the "other" stuff right now gas is too cheap,but this is also why fuel is so high on the east coast when compared to other more mid west regions, we are Nat gas deficient and oil deficient, Nat gas is also the main ingridient in "enviromentally" friendly snow melts ie. Urea. Cheap fertillizer means cheap food, thats the goverments main reason for pushing the regs on nat. gas hydro fracking,
PS My dad making a living supplying these well right now as other frieght is non existant
 
I was born In Westen PA and some of those wells are 50 years plus most a lot newer, If you think the stat are bad on Marcellus wells just wait till you see Utica shale wells, they have abandoned Marcellus for Utica in the region I was born Alot higher yeilding and suprisingly Dirtier, thay are aftre the "other" stuff right now gas is too cheap,but this is also why fuel is so high on the east coast when compared to other more mid west regions, we are Nat gas deficient and oil deficient, Nat gas is also the main ingridient in "enviromentally" friendly snow melts ie. Urea. Cheap fertillizer means cheap food, thats the goverments main reason for pushing the regs on nat. gas hydro fracking,
PS My dad making a living supplying these well right now as other frieght is non existant

That's alot of hawghack !!!!!!
Uttica shale gas yields higher BTUs and is cleaner which fetches a higher $ at NYMEX. Uttica shale gas also has a higher concentration of condensates/oil.
A few of the Uttica wells drilled are producing UN-FRACED and the gas is end user pipeline ready in some cases.
Oil and gas are priced equally everywhere. It's taxes,transportation, and refinement costs that are more or less in different states.
In case you haven't checked lately urea and fertilizer are 400+++++ % higher than they were a decade ago and nat gas storage capacity is at an all time high.
The government isn't pushing any regs on nat gas. Technology advancements have allowed the rules to be changed. There is no lack of oversight like that which has been claimed.
 
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Actually any area that has chemicals introduced into the ground water or air will have a higher disease rate. The area I live in doesn't have fracking it instead has potato farms and it is very hard to find anyone that is not on a inhaler or has/had some type of cancer. Think back, 20 years ago, cancer was almost unheard of, you may have a friend of a friend who may have a relative that has it, now it is rare to find anyone who doesn't have a family member who has/had cancer. Its in our air, its in our water and its in our food. If someone has the money the EPA and other state/federal/county government organizations look the other way.
 
I'd question anyone who is skeptical of science!

VOC's and other solvents and hydrocarbons cause many ailments. This study pointed to quite a large increase.

The question is not "gas good, pollution bad", but rather a series of questions....

1. Is there a better or cleaner way to do it?
2. What responsibility should land owners and gas drillers have to the general public?

and so on....

It's no excuse to say "heck, this other thing is dirty too" since these effects are cumulative. That is, a bit of pollution from this (cars, wood smoke) PLUS some from fracking adds up to bad things.

It's a serious question - same as a lot others. Do the rights of corporations and money....take away some rights from others?

To those who think it is all OK - so, if I might ask, what increase in dangerous compounds in the air do you find acceptable...before those putting them there have to try their best to fix them??

I'm no expert, but there is a BIG reason that Cheney made sure the clean air and clean water regs were thrown aside for fracking gas......and this is part of that reason.

Gas is dirt cheap and there is a glut. I'd rather gas be a lot higher and folks like LEE and the gas drillers make a LOT more - enough to use the best possible technologies to keep others safe and disease free.

As with most other things, you can do it cheap...or you can do it right.
 
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I'd question anyone who is skeptical of science!

VOC's and other solvents and hydrocarbons cause many ailments. This study pointed to quite a large increase.

The question is not "gas good, pollution bad", but rather a series of questions....

1. Is there a better or cleaner way to do it?
2. What responsibility should land owners and gas drillers have to the general public?

and so on....

It's no excuse to say "heck, this other thing is dirty too" since these effects are cumulative. That is, a bit of pollution from this (cars, wood smoke) PLUS some from fracking adds up to bad things.

It's a serious question - same as a lot others. Do the rights of corporations and money....take away some rights from others?

To those who think it is all OK - so, if I might ask, what increase in dangerous compounds in the air do you find acceptable...before those putting them there have to try their best to fix them??

I'm no expert, but there is a BIG reason that Cheney made sure the clean air and clean water regs were thrown aside for fracking gas......and this is part of that reason.

Gas is dirt cheap and there is a glut. I'd rather gas be a lot higher and folks like LEE and the gas drillers make a LOT more - enough to use the best possible technologies to keep others safe and disease free.

As with most other things, you can do it cheap...or you can do it right.
I agree Craig, things can always be improved and with industry expansion , innovation and efficiencys arrise.
The idea that the whole process of fracing is a new thing and is BAD tweeks me.Literally 99% of the people I talk to that are against fracing have absolutely no idea WHY and know very little about the process.
The process/technology has come a long way in 30 years. I've witnessed it first hand.
The study you linked to was done during drilling. I would like to see a before and after study just out of curiosity.
I've seen parts of the so called "exemptions" and those were just minor changes in setbacks and modifications to fluid handling procedures which have been improved industry wide anyway. Do you have a link to the "exemptions"?
 
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Lee, I won't argue your points, by " dirt" I was talking about the condensates , could not remember the word, a far as btu's goes that just means their is a lot more " junk" coming back up doesn't, If Uttica is yielding like the stories I've heard in Unfracked wells that's good isn't it? but the part about natural gas location and the cost of gasoline was just in the news here. A far as rest goes that at least has been government policy in the past, and urea is over priced because the USA makes very little anymore that's a fact, just a few years ago most was coming from Russia, of all places. Politics aside, most things humans do to get large amounts of energy located and moved from one location to another turns out bad. High tension power lines are my example.
As far as fertilizer being higher, I live that nightmare every day.
 
The exemptions were a very big deal.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=safety-first-fracking-second

"In 2005 Congress—at the behest of then Vice President Dick Cheney, a former CEO of gas driller Halliburton—exempted fracking from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act."

It's bad enough that some want to get 100% rid of the EPA - this shows how just one on-purpose loophole can endanger a lot of people!
 
Well:
We have noticed in open loop geothermal well pump-dumps,(~ 4000 to 6000 gallons per day in our wet high yield well water areas...
that had great water for 5+ years in geauga county NE OHIO, now have strange sediment debris plugging ( not iron nor manganese) screens of just 60-mesh...
like never before within 3/4mi of fracking sites within 90-150 days of those working for gas , etc...
 
Well:
We have noticed in open loop geothermal well pump-dumps,(~ 4000 to 6000 gallons per day in our wet high yield well water areas...
that had great water for 5+ years in geauga county NE OHIO, now have strange sediment debris plugging ( not iron nor manganese) screens of just 60-mesh...
like never before within 3/4mi of fracking sites within 90-150 days of those working for gas , etc...
Drive a nail through a Milky Way bar,,,,, you're gonna get chocolate in the nougat. That's as common as spagetti and meatballs and they tell you that may happen that close to a site.
It's just sediment as you said that has been stirred up from the vibration.
 
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