Bans on Fracking
With his characteristically lucid writing style, frequent commenter BreathOnTheWind asks me to clarify my position on fracking. It’s largely the result of conversations I’ve had with energy analyst Glenn Doty and other senior scientists. I’m convinced that:
• Despite widespread belief to the contrary, there is no evidence that fracking causes any measurable level of harm to our health or our environment in terms of overuse of water, injection of toxic chemicals into the regions 15K feet deep, pollution of aquifers/drinking water, earthquakes, etc.
• Natural gas derived from fracking offsets huge amounts of coal–as much as 800 million tons per year in the U.S. alone; coal’s health-related consequences are far worse than anything we could possibly learn about the hazards of fracking.
• Natural gas acts to promote the integration of variable resources (solar and wind) into the grid-mix.
As I see it, the only real downside to fracking is that it perpetuates the overall concept of fossil fuel extraction and consumption. Yes, we need to be on a path towards ridding ourselves of these activities. But it’s an ironic truth that, in this case, the continuation of a practice actually accelerates its demise.
It’s further irony that my position here put me at odds with most self-described “environmentalists,” and, obviously, I’m in touch with a peck of them. I’m as passionate about the subject of sustainability and environmental stewardship as anyone, but they and I have to “agree to disagree” on this point.
Obviously we’re on the same page here.
🙂
Some support you may wish to use. The following data – taken from the EIA, shows the percentage of electricity generated by various sources. In this, renewables include hydroelectric power:
Year, Coal %, NG %, Nuclear %, Renewables%
2000, 51.7%, 15.8%, 19.8%, 9.4%
2002 50.1%, 17.9%, 20.2%, 9.1%
2004 50.0%, 17.7%, 20.0%, 9.1%
2006 49.0%, 20.9%, 19.4%, 9.5%
*****Fracking begins to produce in small volume*****
2008 48.2%, 21.4% 19.6% 9.3%
*****Fracking begins to expand rapidly****
*****Obama becomes president*****
2010 44.8% 23.9% 19.6% 10.4%
2012 39.1% 30.3% 19.0% 12.2%
2014* 38.7% 27.4% 19.5% 13.2%
2015** 36.1% 28.6% 19.8% 13.9%
* – 2014 was famously the year of the polar vortex. The deep-freeze depleted NG inventories and reduced the amount of NG available for electricity as the nation’s NG storage re-filled.
**- Data is limited to the first three monthsof 2015
It’s painfully clear that both the fall of coal and the rise of renewables occurred after the advent of fracking/rise of NG; and after the election of Barack Obama.
Yours stats leave the impression of a direct link between fracking and a reduction in the use of coal to create electricity. Yes you can show a correlation. But the effect of fracking is indirect. Gas recovery companies (the oil companies) would blur this distinction as they continue to seek minimal regulation on the industry. You seem to throw in renewables and the Obama presidency for good measure and I have no idea why you included nuclear energy.
Coal is not boarding its doors and refusing to ship simply because fracking has been permitted to exist. We live in a market economy and outside of government interference or a monopoly it is the price which will determine which product will be used, not the method of extraction. Perhaps we should be inquiring how cheap is natural gas, why is Ngas cheap and how long can we expect it to remain cheap?
Ngas reached a high of over $14 per MMBTU in 2005. Wells are not drilled simply because it is technically possible. The relatively high price of gas promoted investment in new wells. But the market for natural gas is what economists call inelastic. More natural gas does not immediately promote an increased use. [except in the electrical generation industry where peaking plants can be used as base load plants] The relatively low demand and over supply caused the bottom to fall out of the ngas market with ngas losing 80% of its price in the US. We developed a situation where the US price of natural gas is about 25% of world prices: http://newenergyandfuel.com/http:/newenergyandfuel/com/2012/09/27/the-reasons-to-wonder-about-natural-gas-prices/
Forbes gives us 4 reasons why Ngas is so cheap: http://www.forbes.com/sites/investopedia/2012/06/13/4-reasons-natural-gas-is-so-cheap/ but this might be restated as just three: markets are local (land based), fracking has increased supply and there is insufficient demand to match supply. Part of the reason for the optimistic investment in ngas well was the anticipation of exporting the product as LNG but for this port facilities have to be built. This should happen between 2016 to 2019: http://www.investingdaily.com/15162/natural-gas-prices-will-rise-in-2015-on-lng-exports/ Two other possible new markets for ngas would be in cogeneration stationary fuel cells and as a direct fuel for cars.
These developments will take place and with it we will see a rise in natural gas prices. With a rise in prices we are likely to see an increase in the use of coal to produce electricity. It is not the technology but the price. Part of the price is dependent upon technology part is dependent upon available markets which are only going to increase.
That’s very interesting. I wish everyone could see this. Thanks.
No problem…
It’s useful for me to go through excercises like that on occassion just to keep my perspective.
Broadcast it as best you can.
Thanks for your all too brief additional comments. I can appreciate the benefits that additional natural gas supplies and a lower price have given to the US environmentally and to its economy. It is because of this that I find the subject of fracking so very troubling. Mostly I am troubled by the unknowns. Far from settled science Fracking seems to contain a great deal of unknowns:
Geothermal energy had been a bright star in the renewable energy Pantheon. But it also [can] use fracking to help exposed hot rocks to injected water. http://www.esands.com/news/20120424_Fracking_and_Earthquakes.html From this article, “By definition, fracking is breaking rock within the earth, and these breaks create vibrations.” Fracking, “by definition,” [!] causes vibrations within the Earth. The issue then is if these will be felt as Earthquakes and cause social harm. This requires monitoring. To say that fracking does not cause Earthquakes suggests that monitoring is totally unnecessary. To say that Geothermal energy can cause Earthquakes but fracking is free of the problem is deceptive and inconsistent: http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/geothermal-and-tidal/geothermal-energys-promise-and-problems ….something does not seem right.
I will grant that the likelihood may be less in non volcanic areas but nevertheless even the DOI admits that [at this point … that ]waste-water injection in the mid US can cause earthquakes in this announcement: http://www.doi.gov/news/doinews/Is-the-Recent-Increase-in-Felt-Earthquakes-in-the-Central-US-Natural-or-Manmade.cfm Present Earthquakes in Oklahoma are now 600 times historical averages. http://earthquakes.ok.gov/what-we-know/ Can that all be due only to injection sites? I don’t think I would be surprised if tomorrow or next year a geo-scientist suggests that fracking can cause Earthquakes. And I would hardly say the science is settled on the subject.
Toxic chemicals are used as part of the fracking fluid. We are told that they cannot be disclosed because they are “propriatary.” A careful reading of this Halliburton site shows some of the things that the fluids are supposed to do: http://www.halliburton.com/public/projects/pubsdata/Hydraulic_Fracturing/CleanSuite_Technologies.html and by inference some suggestion of what has been used already. Full disclosure has been resisted by the industry: http://www.eenews.net/stories/1059979346 and there is an interest in cleaner alternatives. We can pretend that fluids injected 15K into the ground are harmless but people must create and handle such agents and this does not happen in some place too dark for light.
Fracking fluids are not clean, there are spills, there is waste fluid to be disposed of, accidents will happen and ground water is contaminated. This article concludes by saying that more research is needed: http://phys.org/news/2014-06-groundwater-contamination-fracking-accidents.html Once again this is not the rhetoric of “settled science.”
And so to misquote a highly respected author: “there is […some…] evidence that fracking causes […an unknown…] level of harm to our health or our environment in terms of overuse of water, injection of toxic chemicals into the regions 15K feet deep, pollution of aquifers/drinking water, earthquakes, etc. My appeal would be not for a total ban but to proceed as if with more caution than abandon. Instead what we find is that fracking is being forced on local communities with no recourse: http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/04/23/3650316/oklahoma-local-drilling-bans/
BreathOnTheWind,
I’m going to leave the question of the causality between the reduction of coal and the growth of NG alone for now. It seemed that you started to come out swinging against my assertion, then after exploring the issue for your rebuttal you understood and came back around.
(FWIW, I included nuclear and renewables merely to demonstrate that these were not principal factors).
Anyway. It’s clear that you are concerned by fracking, and you are passionate in that concern… so I’ll try to help.
First: Earthquakes.
The idea of fracking causing earthquakes can easily be settled by a single word: “small”.
Hydraulic fracturing involves using a shaped charge to blast a suspension of water and sand into a crack, the blast has enough force to allow the water to force open the crack, and the sand then remains – wedging the crack open so that trapped gasses and liquids can flow out the crack. So we’re talking about a few dozen kg of RDX going off in a tube filled with sand and water (the water does include some chemicals to increase its lubricity and surface tension).
The total moment energy of an earthquake measuring “2” on the Richter Scale is going to be over 1.2 TJ. For an earthquake measuring “3” on the Richter Scale, the total moment energy is going to be ~39 TJ. To get to “4”, you’ll exceed a PJ.
Typical rock blasting explosive charges have explosive energy of ~5 MJ/kg. So to get enough explosives together to cause an earthquake that measures “2” on the Richter scale, you’d theoretically need about 200 tons. They aren’t using that much. This means that the earthquakes that are indeed caused by fracking are events that are releasing already pent-up energy within the upper crust. If you were to set off a hundred mini-earthquakes measuring around “2”, that would then theoretically alleviate as much stress in the crust as would be released by a “4”…. If you were to set off 10,000 such mini-earthquakes, you’d theoretically release as much energy as a “6”… etc…
That doesn’t seem like a bad thing to me. 2’s and 3’s don’t really cause damage, and if they clearly reflect far greater energy than what is available in the explosives, then wouldn’t this then reduce the future threat of a larger earthquake?
Enhanced geothermal and oil/NG fracking use the exact same technique, btw…
While you can convince me that perhaps some cases may present enough of a threat that it’s not worth a risk of setting off a known stress (such as the great cauldera of Yellowstone National Park), I don’t see the issue in relatively low-stress regions such as the badlands or the Great Plains.
Second: Toxins.
The issue here is the well casings. Literally nothing else matters. I’m a strong proponent of tightening regulations on well casings to an absurd degree, but if the well casing is solid, there will be no inter-mixing of the natural gas reservoirs and the aquifers that are 3 km above them. Try to imagine the water flow through capillary action over a vertical distance of 3 km… The total potential there is on the order of mg/year into an aquifer basin measured in trillions of gallons of water. It’s just not a valid concern. A very fair bet would be that the natural soil overtop an energy-dense shale formation would be responsible for ~10 billion times as much contamination into the aquifer as would the capillary action exchange of fracking fluids 3 km deeper underground.
*shrug*
If the well casing doesn’t leak, then there isn’t a problem. That makes fracking exactly the same as traditional vertical drilling.
Thanks. I was going to take this on, but I knew you’d do a better job. It’s “BreathOnTheWind,” btw.
Oops… my bad.
If you could correct my post concerning his name, that was not intentional.
I’ve thought about doing a more complete post concerning the relationship between NG and coal. It’s pretty clear that BreathontheWind, and doubtless many others like him/her have some level of understanding with some specific areas where they’re confused… and it would be nice to spend some time organizing a primer on that…
It’s probably worth the excercise, but Rochelle and I have been tied up, so the work on thecenterhold is waiting for her to get enough time to get back to it. (It was supposed to be a project we worked on together…)
I fixed it. It’s a shame WordPress doesn’t enable users to edit their own comments; this comes up frequently.
There is a saying: “you can call me anything but late for dinner.” Thanks for the concern about the name, but there are more important issues. Perhaps you are not aware that it is extremely condescending, likely biased and certainly uncommunicative to refer to anyone you disagree with as “confused.” Perhaps the Khmer Rouge thought all people who used glasses were “confused” when they decided to execute them all. With a nod to Craig’s latest post, I wouldn’t think you were “evil” for such a pronouncement but perhaps a bit naive. It does make me wonder what else you might not be considering, but otherwise I don’t understand the motivation or utility for such language.
We often don’t understand the context of comments, especially those made by relatively unknown authors. I live in NY state which has enacted a ban on fracking, for now. I have enjoyed conversations with lawmakers and contributors to that process. I have had enough science to follow the technology but my stronger potential is in research and writing. I am aware of the “pit bull” style of writing but prefer it as a choice rather than a compulsion. In many ways we are not so far apart. It is a matter of emphasis.
I appreciate your description of the fracking process but you seem to think, once again, that there is a direct causation between one thing and another. In this case fracking explosions and earthquakes. Rather the primary concern is the instability-potential created in the ground that can be leveraged by intra-plate earthquake-dynamics: http://www.sms-tsunami-warning.com/pages/intra-inter-plate-events Oklahoma (mid plate) is presently experiencing over 500 level 3 or above Earthquakes each year which is 600 times historical averages. I doubt that all of this new activity can be attributed to excessive waste-water injection (or new fracking.) http://earthquakes.ok.gov/what-we-know/
Further, to characterize fracking for geothermal installations as having “earthquake potential” [ http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/geothermal-and-tidal/geothermal-energys-promise-and-problems ] and not to label fracking for natural gas with the same language seems inconsistent and strongly suggests an agenda. To deny that any fracking has earthquake potential seems disingenuous at best and may be simple deception particularly when, by definition, fracking creates vibrations and instability. At the very least, it should be clear that this is a problem that needs to be balanced against potential benefits and not simply pushed aside “as settled science,” or “no evidence of harm…”
But the ban on fracking in NY state depends more upon concerns about toxins. Once again you reference the direct effect of drilling fluids in the ground and once again seems to be essentially a “straw man” argument as many of the concerns are with indirect effects: waste-water pools, spillage at the site, and the inevitable accidents. There is evidence of toxic effects from fracking, sometimes overblown, sometimes even falsified by hysterical and even radical conservative environmentalists (in the traditional sense) but nevertheless it exists: http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2010/06/fracking-in-pennsylvania-201006 To say the “science is settled” or there is “no evidence of harm” is logically false with even one example. Dimcock, Pennsylvania is that example. Tell me is was “all an accident” and I reaffirm that accidents can happen. It should not be swept “under the rug” with blanket statements that “there is no harm.” This is suspiciously like the often quoted example of deception, “there is no man behind that curtain…”
Fracking is not magic. It is not automatically beneficial and beautiful. It is a technology to be managed. Ignoring facts is not management. It is willful ignorance.
Breathonthewind,
I am sorry that you are offended by my word choice, but it is very clear from your earlier post that you do not understand the multi-layered market complexity of the NG world. You can take that as you wish, but that statement is not meant to insult… it is simply accurate based on the post you made above.
As for the rest, you seem to be responding to someone else – not me. I acknowledged the correlation between fracking and earthquakes, and showed that the energy release in the earthquake was orders-of-magnitude greater than the energy released in the fracking process.
As for the toxins, I had stated that greater regulation of well casings was justified – and something that I support… but if the well casing holds then their is no contamination of ground water. To my knowledge, there hasn’t been an incident in the gas fracking world where a tailing pond has overspilled into other water resources. That has happened many times – to devastating effect – with coal, where the tailing ponds are many hundredsfold larger.
Here FYI is a call to ban fracking in California to avoid the Earthquake risk associated with wastewater injection. http://ecowatch.com/2014/03/13/fracking-waste-wells-put-californians-risk-earthquakes/
Here FYI is a case of 3 million gallons of fracking waste-water spilling into a North Dakota river. It was from a pipe not a pond: http://ecowatch.com/2015/01/23/fracking-wastewater-spill-north-dakota/ But as long as some fracking waste-water is being recovered, stored or shipped on the surface accidents will happen. If the disposal of waste-water remains unregulated we are not managing we are ignoring. Also it would be prudent for first responders to know what is in fluids they might encounter when responding to accidents.
Here is another perspective on the same incident that includes this quote: “In 2013 alone, there were 74 pipeline leaks that spilled 22,000 barrels of saltwater. Yet that same year, the North Dakota Legislature voted 86 to 4 against a bill that would have mandated flow meters and cutoff switches on wastewater-disposal pipelines. Energy companies protested the cost of such measures, and even state regulators argued they wouldn’t detect small leaks.” http://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Huge-ND-Wastewater-Spill-Prompts-Calls-For-Fracking-Regs.html
So rather than “no leaks” it seems that leaking of waste-water is another fracking problem.
At the end of the day, it is pointless to argue what knowledge or background I have. You are the scientist, I am only a researcher and writer. I expect you and all our scientists to have a greater knowledge of the technology you research.
Although some may, I don’t expect scientists to be magicians or omniscient beings. That position may already be taken. It is also probably better if science is not influenced by value judgements, money or politics. But all of these faults can and do happen. And so I am among those who question and review as best as we are able. Because we cannot pontificate based upon our expertise we carefully string quotes and cites along and hope that logic and rhetoric are our friends. You could take this personally or as a threat but some might know how to make it an aid. We need you, scientists, but we need you to be the best that you can be.
BreathontheWind,
I appreciate the kind words, and I really wasn’t intending to be insulting. I respect your passion and believe that I share it… I just understand we can’t get from where we are to utopia very quickly – especially given our current political climate and the limitations that places on the resources we will have at our disposal.
I will acknowledge minor spills with regard to the waste water. That’s an issue, and bears greater regulation. Note I am not aligned with the fossil fuel industry, and I’ve repeatedly called for greater regulations.
But I support fracking because it isn’t coal. Every single GWh that is not produced by natural gas is going to be produced by coal. This will remain the case for at least 3 decades.
So while you found a relatively minor pipeline leak of 3 million gallons of fracking waste water, look at this:
http://www.wise-uranium.org/mdaf.html
There are REALLY BAD things out there that are an unfortunate result of our Faustian bargain with modern industrialization… and among them coal is king.
I don’t believe that fracking is the best thing on the planet, But I would happily take 1000 pipeline leaks of fracking wastewater rather than 1 single Kingston Fossil plant retention wall failure. There have been 3 major such failures in the US and Canada in the past decade involving coal… and that is literally just the tip of the (rapidly melting) iceberg.
I’ve read the literature concerning fracking and minor tremors, and I find it non-compelling. As did the EPA under Obama, btw.
I just think that hydraulic fracturing is vastly preferable to more coal, and so I support fracking. I think that if the far left would look at the issue more pragmatically, they would also come to the conclusion that fracking is a major step forward from coal, and they should embrace it but call for greater regulation…
Time will tell.
I didn’t think you intended to be insulting, I suspect you could have put a better effort to that task, but it is very easy to be negligently insulting. You may find that labeling someone or a group as “confused” is less helpful than referring to issues as “often confusing topics.” By directing your comments to the issues rather than the people an offense is more easily avoided. Sadly rhetoric is not generally a field of study associated with business or science. Similarly to conflate indirect and direct connections and can be a sign of an intelligent and intuitive mind, but it is the discipline of logic that allows us to find errors and avoid bias. Philosophy is also not generally part of the modern business or scientific schooling.
Many feel that the primary limitations we face are physical: resources and energy. Often I wonder if the greater limitations are locked within the mysteries of consciousness of which economics and politics are only small windows. For example, is too easy for many to see the physical manifestation of electric cars today and fail to understand the concept. The concept tells us future potential advantages and disadvantages.
You ” support fracking because it isn’t coal ” but add, ” Every single GWh that is not produced by natural gas is going to be produced by coal.” Some fear most the obverse of this, that every GWh not produced by coal will be produced by natural gas… leaving no place for renewable energy development. To those with this concern this is like putting our energy system on life support and declaring a triumph when what is needed is a transplant. Sure, “coal” is “cancer” but “Ngas” viewed as “life support” is not much better.
You seem confident that the situation is “sustainable” for at least 3 decades, but I am reminded of the energy history of England and its experience with a “glut” of newly found Ngas from the North Sea. The gas markets expanded rapidly with the new supply. And then the gas ran out: “Since 2005, the UK has been a net imported of natural gas after stocks in the North Sea began to peter out.” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/10629598/UKs-dependence-on-gas-imports-to-blame-for-high-prices-not-Centrica.html
There is a great deal of discussion about developing export facilities. To add insult the ports are likely to be built at taxpayer expense and will effectively raise prices for consumers. (within 2 to 5 years) http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/04/07/us-natural-gas-exports-to-begin/7204925/ Once this is done US gas will begin to equalize with the world market which is 4 to 6 times higher in price.
There will concurrently be pressure to fuel vehicles with natural gas either directly or using the subterfuge of hydrogen cars. The hydrogen will continue to be made from natural gas as most of it is today, because it is the cheapest method. Normalizing the price for natural gas will then usher in a return to coal as a cheaper fuel for electricity and all the stomping for fracking will only benefit investors somewhat and corporations. Consumers, as usual, will be left with hotter, more polluted air, and the addition of a much larger percentage of a far more potent greenhouse gas: methane. Energy life support will end and we may well wish we had pushed for the transplant.
The only way we should be developing natural gas is with a close tie to supporting the development of renewable resources. The life support should anticipate and promote the transplant. To keep funds away from the Government general fund, perhaps some requirement that for every MMbtu produced so much renewable energy must also be produced. An “energy company” can retain ownership of both but both should be developed? Perhaps we would not get “off” coal quite so quickly, but then again it may be that such a plan would give us a far more robust energy supply than markets alone will provide.