Geologically speaking, water held in the ground is VERY far removed from the level fracking is done at.
True to a certain extent - the actual hydrocarbons are way below the aquifer. However, the hydrocarbons have to 1) pass through the aquifer on the way up to the pipe and 2) the enormous amount of fluids (mostly water) used in hydraulic (there's that word again) fracturing has to go somewhere as well.
The first problem is solved by making sure that casing / cementing of the well is done correctly. That usually happens and there are places where that pretty much always happens but you need careful oversight to make sure that fly-by-night bozos like BP (ie, the Macondo well) don't screw it up. The second problem is mitigated, again, by making sure that disposal processes are tightly controlled - that you don't dump the waste water in a nearby stream or pond or just sneak it through a municipal waste water system that isn't designed to deal with these specific contaminants.
Actually, the wikipedia article I cited was mostly about the casing - but it's just part of the same issue and problem. You can screw a well up in a variety of entertaining and expensive ways.
Nice description but I think it would be better as a car analogy....
The one bit that you didn't mention (on top of 100+ years of the minutia of drilling technology) is the casing. That seems to be where many of the problems have occurred (the other is bad water disposal practices - mostly a political issue rather than a technical one). As the well is drilled, pieces of pipe are dropped in to create an open bore. It isn't just one giant piece of metal, it's a series of tubes. Of different sizes and types. They are sealed via several methods but the most problematic one is cementing. It is a complicated, expensive process and, in fact, the primary reason that the Macondo well failed.
If you don't cement properly stuff leaks out. Hydrocarbons, all the icky stuff in the fracking fluid. Drilling mud (which isn't so terribly benign by itself).
IANACI (I am not a cementing engineer) but from my limited petrogeology courses a billion years ago and my reading of the issue it's like many complex, high tech things - you can take the time and money to do it right, or you can cheat and try to cheap out. Which often works, but when it fails, it makes an unholy mess.
Fracking is one of those things that needs to be done correctly. All of the time. It can be done, it has been done in many places (Horizontal fracturing has been done extensively for 50+ years and is only now the current boggie man). There are places where it can be done (relatively) safely. There are places where it shouldn't be done at all and all manner in between.
Is it just me, or does copying a $100m spy drone that you easily captured seem like a bad direction to go?
No, seems like a great idea. Give the plans to China, have them make a cheap clone.
Sell 'em on Ebay.
I'd buy one. In fact, I bet most of the audience here would save their pennies and recycle their Dorita bags until they could afford one. A UAV based MMOG? Priceless.
'Undamaged' is relative. Remember they didn't show the undercarriage in their pictures, it was all gussied up with banners. Either the Iranians have decided that the drone is female and has to be modestly dressed, or the thing crash landed / wheels up landed and has a fair bit of damage.
Sure. All we have to do is kill 3/4 of our population, and we can use way less oil. Oil sustains life here, get used to it.
Well, at first glance, it would appear that the dominant form of life in the US is an automobile - so killing 75% of them would be a good start to decreasing our fossil fuel use.
Boeing has been in Wichita, KS for generations (since WWII). In 2005, they were Wichita's largest employer. They've pulled back over the past couple of years, but still maintain a significant presence, as does Airbus, Cessna and a couple of other aeronautical companies.
I just love it that Alaska isn't considered 'part of the country'. Maybe we should just go back to being in Russia, although I would prefer Canada myself.
The Olympics are in London this year? I knew there was an Olympics in London coming up, because huge cost overruns have been in the news. But I thought it was years in the future.
The cost overruns in the future are designed to pay for the cost overruns for this summer's Olympics. When you're dealing with boondoggles of this magnitude, you really must plan ahead.
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It should buy us a few decades of relatively cheap, relatively low carbon producing (well at least compared to coal and oil shale) energy.
Did you miss the part where TFA stated that oil needed to go to $200 a barrel for these reserves to be economically recoverable?
Geologically speaking, water held in the ground is VERY far removed from the level fracking is done at.
True to a certain extent - the actual hydrocarbons are way below the aquifer. However, the hydrocarbons have to 1) pass through the aquifer on the way up to the pipe and 2) the enormous amount of fluids (mostly water) used in hydraulic (there's that word again) fracturing has to go somewhere as well.
The first problem is solved by making sure that casing / cementing of the well is done correctly. That usually happens and there are places where that pretty much always happens but you need careful oversight to make sure that fly-by-night bozos like BP (ie, the Macondo well) don't screw it up. The second problem is mitigated, again, by making sure that disposal processes are tightly controlled - that you don't dump the waste water in a nearby stream or pond or just sneak it through a municipal waste water system that isn't designed to deal with these specific contaminants.
Actually, the wikipedia article I cited was mostly about the casing - but it's just part of the same issue and problem. You can screw a well up in a variety of entertaining and expensive ways.
Nice description but I think it would be better as a car analogy....
The one bit that you didn't mention (on top of 100+ years of the minutia of drilling technology) is the casing. That seems to be where many of the problems have occurred (the other is bad water disposal practices - mostly a political issue rather than a technical one). As the well is drilled, pieces of pipe are dropped in to create an open bore. It isn't just one giant piece of metal, it's a series of tubes. Of different sizes and types. They are sealed via several methods but the most problematic one is cementing. It is a complicated, expensive process and, in fact, the primary reason that the Macondo well failed.
If you don't cement properly stuff leaks out. Hydrocarbons, all the icky stuff in the fracking fluid. Drilling mud (which isn't so terribly benign by itself).
IANACI (I am not a cementing engineer) but from my limited petrogeology courses a billion years ago and my reading of the issue it's like many complex, high tech things - you can take the time and money to do it right, or you can cheat and try to cheap out. Which often works, but when it fails, it makes an unholy mess.
Fracking is one of those things that needs to be done correctly. All of the time. It can be done, it has been done in many places (Horizontal fracturing has been done extensively for 50+ years and is only now the current boggie man). There are places where it can be done (relatively) safely. There are places where it shouldn't be done at all and all manner in between.
You should log in next time so we can help you with your sense of humor.
Do they change the little reflector signs on the back of traffic markers?
I've always wanted to talk to those folks.
Is it just me, or does copying a $100m spy drone that you easily captured seem like a bad direction to go?
No, seems like a great idea. Give the plans to China, have them make a cheap clone.
Sell 'em on Ebay.
I'd buy one. In fact, I bet most of the audience here would save their pennies and recycle their Dorita bags until they could afford one. A UAV based MMOG? Priceless.
'Undamaged' is relative. Remember they didn't show the undercarriage in their pictures, it was all gussied up with banners. Either the Iranians have decided that the drone is female and has to be modestly dressed, or the thing crash landed / wheels up landed and has a fair bit of damage.
He's probably the only one on staff not celebrating 4-20.
Are you kidding? If the editors got totally baked, it could only improve their efforts.
I, for one, would welcome our totally zoned out Slashdot Overlords^HEditors.
Unfortunately it also has niggers. Which pretty much negates any other advantages it might have.
Unfortunately, we have you, AC, which definitely negates any other advantage that Slashdot has.
Sure. All we have to do is kill 3/4 of our population, and we can use way less oil. Oil sustains life here, get used to it.
Well, at first glance, it would appear that the dominant form of life in the US is an automobile - so killing 75% of them would be a good start to decreasing our fossil fuel use.
I looked at the map. Most of the blue areas were areas that are actually desert.
Now doesn't that make the answer obvious?
Sandworms.
Err, 80, eighty.
Although 8 million dollars (said with evil lisp) really should generate enough paper to act as a primary shield for the reactor itself.
Four years I can deal with - hell it takes that long to site a hydro plant these days.
Eight to 100 million dollars sounds, shall we say, just a little bit fucking insane.
Boeing has been in Wichita, KS for generations (since WWII). In 2005, they were Wichita's largest employer. They've pulled back over the past couple of years, but still maintain a significant presence, as does Airbus, Cessna and a couple of other aeronautical companies.
You're all correct....
I just love it that Alaska isn't considered 'part of the country'. Maybe we should just go back to being in Russia, although I would prefer Canada myself.
Look up Toshiba 4S. Then give a big 'hello' to Galena, Alaska (who has been trying to do this for a decade or so).
You're all wrong. It's turtles, all the way down.
Or maybe the code was more like "Pound pastrami, can kraut, six bagels--bring home for Emma."
You never know.
Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg, welcome to Slashdot!
Gadget wise we're doing better.
Real income for the majority of Americans and Europeans, the structure of society, the fundamentals of the economy, our infrastructure - not so much.
Not to mention the upcoming specter of resource wars and our ever increasing tendencies towards a police state.
We've changed our view of the apocalypse from nuclear Armageddon to the "Hunger Games" but it's still not a very rosy future.
So we should give the terrorists lots of nukes and a command and control system?
Sounds perfectly reasonable.
You're just a couple thousand years late.
The Olympics are in London this year? I knew there was an Olympics in London coming up, because huge cost overruns have been in the news. But I thought it was years in the future.
The cost overruns in the future are designed to pay for the cost overruns for this summer's Olympics. When you're dealing with boondoggles of this magnitude, you really must plan ahead.
Did anyone here actually believe this? The big power draw is from the backlight, which is still running even with black pixels.
No, the big power draw is from CRT displays.
Both of them. They'll die someday and things will be nice and green again....