Fracking Is Not The Cleanest Alternative For Oil...

Fracking The term, â€Å"fracking† has existed for nearly a half century and has always had the negative connotations of being unclean and the source for many environmental issues and adverse health effects. The massive oil deposits recovered by modern hydraulic fracturing can be considered as the oil boom of the twenty-first century and with new methods, safety procedures, and technology, potential hazards can be reduced or even eliminated. Due to the many possible hazards of the fracking process, it has initiated much political discussion at the state and federal levels of government, while inciting concern of local citizens. Fracking is not the cleanest alternative to oil reclamation, but has improved drastically with the introduction of†¦show more content†¦However, fracking fluid is not the only questionable aspect of fracking, included is land and infrastructure degradation, physiological harm to local citizens, utilization of legislation loopholes, and the secr ecy of fracking fluid formulas within the industry. Nonetheless, the negative attributes of fracking, such as fracking fluid dispersal and other environmental issues are outweighed by the vast economic gains and can be mitigated by a system of regulations and development of new technologies for the industry. The fracking industry will only increase in size, so much so that reclamation of shale gas is called â€Å"eminent shale gas revolution. British Petroleum [BP], for instance, expects global shale gas production to grow six-fold from 2011 to 2030. Shale gas production in the United States already accounts for roughly 30 percent of the nationwide total a growth rate up from only 4 percent in 2005† (Sovacool, 251). It has also been estimated that more than â€Å"80 percent of the natural gas wells developed in the United States over the next ten years are expected to require fracking and it is projected that by 2035 natural gas wells will represent more than a 75 percent s hare of the domestic supply† (Bleiwas, 68). Natural gas exploration began in the late 1940s’ to extract the natural gas located in underground reserves. The process consisted of digging a vertical well into the ground to release gas trapped in relatively