When you buy through links on our internet site , we may earn an affiliate commission . Here ’s how it works .
Fetid , inflammable , contaminated drinking water in Pennsylvania homes near innate gas drilling sites was contaminate by methane lam from flawed fracking wells , a unexampled study shows .
base on geochemical forensics employment , the research makes a verbatim radio link between tainted drinking water and leaky gas well in theMarcellus Shale . The sway layer is yard of metrical foot below the surface , but the leaks are shallow , where cementum and steel are supposed to harbour water supply supply from lifelike gas inside wells . scientist saw the same connection in Texas , above the Barnett Shale , they cover today ( Sept. 15 ) in the diary Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .
Marcellus Shale natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania.
" This does provide middling strong evidence that it ’s a well integrity problem and not a fracking problem , " say lead field of study author Tom Darrah , a geochemist at The Ohio State University in Columbus .
The DOE manufacture has contested claims thatfrackingcan contaminate pee supplying . Fracking is the process of shatter deeply buried rock to relinquish pin down natural gas . petroleum and gas companies have claimed that drinking water pollution may be make by methane gas tardily bubbling up naturally through cracks in rock layers . Other groups have deliberate whether the methane came from fracking , horizontal drilling or leaking well . [ In Photos : The World ’s 9 Most Polluted Places ]
In the study , researchers traced methane gas in more than 130 Pennsylvania and Texas piddle fountainhead to ill sealed , crack or failing fracking wells . Several layers of cement and brand typically protect shallow underground water supplies from gas and fluid pulsing through fracking wells . The thickest layers are at the top , to create a buffer store between the well and groundwater . The wells narrow with profoundness , similar in shape to a scope .
Both the cementum and steel shell can fail because of hurt during installing , corrosion , invention flaws or long time — known as " well wholeness problem . “Methane gas will escapethrough any openings .
The discovery means there is Bob Hope for Pennsylvania ’s polluted drink water , Darrah allege . Fixing exist wells and preserve a acute eye on new oil production site could subdue pollution .
" There ’s actually a little bit of dependable news , " Darrah told Live Science . " If we ameliorate well unity , we can eradicate a lot of the environmental problems that have fence in fracking so far , " he said .
Widespread effects
About 6 per centum of Pennsylvania ’s fracking wells have documented well passing water , according to a June 30 , 2014 , work by technology prof Anthony Ingraffea of Cornell University in Ithaca , New York . Up to 100,000 new fracking well could be drilled in Pennsylvania in the next few decades .
But methane is n’t the onlycontaminant in drink in water wellsnear natural gun fracking sites . Dangerous tier ofarsenicand barium have also been found . piquant natural brine from deep careen bed are also migrating upward toward the control surface . An Environmental Protection Agency review of nationwide well guard and fracking ’s event on pee provision is due this year .
The boom in fracking ( or hydraulic fracturing ) has boosted U.S. natural - accelerator product by 30 percentage in the past decade . The boring has also sparked anincrease in moderate earthquakesin state such as Oklahoma , Arkansas and New Mexico , as well as fears of far-flung environmental contaminant . leak wells also pass off methane into the atmosphere , where thegreenhouse gasis about 34 fourth dimension more effective at pin down infrared irradiation ( the greenhouse impression ) than carbon copy dioxide , though methane breaks down much more quickly than CO2 .
Measuring methane
Darrah said multiple wrinkle of evidence confirm the methane leakage come from the Marcellus and Barnett shales , or from shallower methane air pocket in overlying rocks . Carbon isotope revealed the methane was created by high temperature and pressure , not from germ in groundwater . ( Isotopes are translation of the same constituent with different number of neutron in their nucleus . )
Trace amount of noble gases help determine how tight the gas bubble into drinking water supplies . Naturally rising methane should have about 10,000 times more He than the gas polluting the drinking water wells , Darrah enunciate . But the helium , neon and argon indicate the methane hurry to the surface via a fracking well , and then leaked out into groundwater .
" Somehow , these gases finagle to get to the surface without going through any water or rock , and in some cases , we could actually document well wholeness was the job , " Darrah said .
