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Recent Paper Shows Fracking Chemicals In Drinking Water, Industry Attacks It
eldavojohn writes: A recent paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences turned up 2-Butoxyethanol from samples collected from three households in Pennsylvania. The paper's level headed conclusion is that more conservative well construction techniques should be used to avoid this in the future and that flowback should be better controlled. Rob Jackson, another scientist who reviewed the paper, stressed that the findings were an exception to normal operations. Despite that, the results angered the PR gods of the Marcellus Shale Gas industry and awoke beltway insider mouthpieces to attack the research — after all, what are they paying them for?
Can someone enlighten me as to why funky chemicals are needed to break rocks?
They are not needed to break the rocks, but to dissolve the hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons are not normally soluble in water, so you need detergents or other chemicals to form an emulsion that can be pumped to the surface. After the hydrocarbons are separated, the "funky chemicals" are mostly recycled and pumped back down the hole. But they are temporarily stored in holding ponds, which can leak if not properly sealed. Some of the chemicals also leak because of bad seals on the pumps and pipe joints. It is unlikely that there is leakage directly from the shale, so the groundwater contamination is not an inherent problem with fracking, but rather with sloppy practices and corner cutting.