Fracking 101

A little natural gas humor.mp4

Fracking is a debated environmental and political issue. Industry’s insist it is a safe and economical source of clean energy; critics, however, claim fracking can destroy drinking water and supplies, pollute the air and contribute to greenhouse gases that cause global warming.

The Big Secret?

What is in hydraulic fracturing fluids?

Water and proppant (usually sand) typically account for more than 99 percent of the content in the typical fracking fluid mix. The remaining less than 1 percent is made up of chemical additives designed to reduce friction and prevent corrosion, among other things. Many of these can be found in every-day life: guar gum (toothpaste, ice cream and other food products), surfactants (similar to dish soap) and solvents (such as mineral oil).

Does fracking cause flaming water faucets?

A pair of anti-hydraulic fracturing films depict landowners lighting their water, but it was determined the methane in those cases had nothing to do with fracking. One involved a Colorado case in which investigating state regulators determined the methane was “not related to oil and gas activity,” but to the landowner drilling his water well through several natural gas-bearing rock zones.

Do the additives used in hydraulic fracturing pose a health risk?

Many of the additives used during hydraulic fracturing also are found in items common to any household. State regulations and industry-developed standards help ensure that wells are properly constructed to prevent these additives from leaking into the environment. It is also worth noting that, to date, there have been no cases of hydraulic fracturing fluids migrating up from fracturing depths (~4,000 feet) to contaminate groundwater.

Every oil and natural gas well contains multiple layers of steel and concrete, which isolate what’s inside the well from groundwater. The U.S. Energy Department has concluded that hydraulic fracturing “has proven to be a safe and effective stimulation technique.”

Can fracking cause air pollution?

A study done by the University of Texas in coordination with the Environmental Defense Fund finds that methane emissions from the upstream portion of the supply chain are only 0.38 percent of production. That’s about 10 percent lower than what the same research team found in a study released in September 2013. The researchers also noted that a small number of sites accounted for the majority of emissions, suggesting that technologies already in use across the industry are effectively managing methane leakage.

Does Fracking cause earthquakes?

"We are still under a region that is trying to shift, but it is relatively slow," said Dr. Bryan Tapp, Ph.D. Dr. Tapp says you can blame this on events that first

happened 300 million years ago. He says when the Wichita, Arbuckle, and Ouachita Mountains were formed, the ground rose up. But just north of the Wichita and Ouachita Mountains the ground sunk and formed the Anadarko and Arkoma basins.

This action caused a fault line to form between the two basins, that fault line is where the epicenter to these large earthquakes is located. He says the earth is still trying to relieve pressure from those long ago geologic events.

"So we just seem to be relaxing, just slightly, over time," he said.

One thing he's positive of: this mess was not caused by fracking.

How much water does hydraulic fracturing use?

The average fracking job uses roughly 4 million gallons of water per well – or about as much water as New York City uses every six minutes and about 1.3 percent of the water used by the country’s car washes every day.

That can vary by state, because the amount of water used in each hydraulic fracturing job depends on geology and a number of other factors.

In California, for example, the average fracking job needed more than 116,000 gallons of water. Yet, that’s less than half the water used every day to irrigate the average California golf course.

Why do we frac and what does it look like?

Once the well is drilled, cased and cemented, small perforations are made in the horizontal portion of the well pipe, through which a typical mixture of water (90 percent), sand (9.5 percent) and additives (0.5 percent) (usually called slickwater) is pumped at high pressure to create micro-fractures in the rock that are held open by the grains of sand. Additives play a number of roles, including helping to reduce friction (thereby reducing the amount of pumping pressure from diesel-powered sources, which reduces air emissions) and prevent pipe corrosion, which in turn help protect the environment and boost well efficiency.

Now for the demonstration!!