[OKC] Dark Side of a Natural Gas Boom

[Shauna Struby]

Article in yesterday's NY Times .. quotes Chesapeake & Devon .

 

December 8, 2009


Dark Side of a Natural Gas Boom 


By JAD MOUAWAD
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/jad_mouawad/in
dex.html?inline=nyt-per>  and CLIFFORD KRAUSS
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/k/clifford_kraus
s/index.html?inline=nyt-per> 

DIMOCK, Pa. - Victoria Switzer dreamed of a peaceful retirement in these
Appalachian hills. Instead, she is coping with a big problem after a nearby
natural gas <http://www.nytimes.com/info/natural-gas/?inline=nyt-classifier>
well contaminated her family's drinking water with high levels of methane.

Through no design of hers, Ms. Switzer has joined a rising chorus of voices
skeptical of the nation's latest energy push. "It's been 'drill, baby,
drill' out here," Ms. Switzer said bitterly. "There is no stopping this
train."

 

Across vast regions of the country, gas companies are using a technology
called hydraulic fracturing to produce natural gas from previously untapped
beds of shale. The push has been so successful that the country's potential
gas reserves jumped by 35 percent in two years. The new supplies have driven
down natural gas prices for consumers and might help the global environment
by allowing more production of electricity from natural gas, which emits
fewer global warming
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/globalwarming/index.html?
inline=nyt-classifier>  emissions than coal.

 

What the drilling push will do to local environments is another matter.

 

More here :::
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/08/business/energy-environment/08fracking.htm
l?ref=energy-environment 

 

Shauna, OKC

 

 

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