The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation hosted a forum last night for Binghamton’s citizens to voice their opinions about fracking. Though the DEC has stated it is still listening to New Yorkers’ comments and concerns about fracking, signs currently point to fracking becoming a reality in many parts of upstate New York next year. And we think this could spell disaster for our land, water, air and citizens’ health.
Right now, there is a substantial amount of evidence suggesting that the dangers of fracking far outweigh its benefits. The industrial process involves drilling into deep, subterranean bedrock and pumping water and chemicals down to break up the rock to allow bubbles of gas to reach the surface. Reports show that hydrofracking produces wastewater that is not properly treated before it reaches the drinking water supply for much of the region that sits atop the Marcellus Shale formation.
Former Gov. David Paterson issued a fracking moratorium in New York in 2010, but the state did not renew the ban this year. The indications that state officials are one step closer to allowing hydrofracking to commence is deeply unsettling.
There is no reason to rush into fracking before there is sufficient research to prove that it won’t endanger the public.
We do understand fracking’s enticing nature. We are over-reliant on foreign energy sources. The global demand for energy is rapidly increasing. The business could be a lucrative one for depressed economies, specifically for those property-owners who lease the land where the drilling takes place.
So why not drill for natural gas stateside? Clearly, we are in a bind and we need to find alternative energy sources. Not to mention, many cities that lay atop the natural gas, cities that have been economically-depressed for decades, could use the boost. It almost seems too good to be true.
But that’s because it is. Gas companies pull up stakes and go elsewhere when their wells run dry, leaving communities as depressed as ever, and the land and water filled with toxic pollutants. Simply put, research suggests that there is currently no way to frack safely.
There’s no reason to rush into the process, because the Marcellus Shale isn’t going anywhere. While traditional methods of finding and developing energy are not ideal, they do not put the health and safety of civilians and the environment at risk as dangerously as fracking does.
Pennsylvania has been in the fracking business for some time now, and the state has demonstrated its side effects. Wastewater is often trucked to sewage plants and then discharged into rivers that supply drinking water, and the state’s sewage treatment plants are not equipped to remove heavy metals from the water.
It is too soon for New York, or any other state, to jump into the fold. When (or if) research concludes that fracking — properly taxed and regulated — won’t unnecessarily endanger our environmental well-being, much less human life, it will be worth considering. But for now, let’s leave the Marcellus Shale alone.