The most recent Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking was published in December 2020. The full text can be read and downloaded at no cost at the Concerned Health Professionals of NY website.
What you wish you didn’t know about fracking
“Asthma. Hair loss. Burning eyes. Burning skin. Tremors. Mouth ulcers. Heart palpitations. Stomach cramps. Headaches. Nosebleeds. Vomiting. Projectile diarrhea. Lesions. Loss of balance. Slurred speech. Spitting blood. Abscessed teeth. Sick horses. Dead goats. Dead dogs, dead chickens, dead cats. Dead cows.” Read more…
(Video highlighting concern over lack of preparedness by local governments in the case of a blowout.)
Current Scale of Development in Ohio
As of March 2013, “Ohio has 275,000 [oil & gas] wells drilled of which 65,000 are active. The peak year was 1980 when 6,085 were drilled. Many fewer are drilled now because lateral fracking means less need for vertical shafts. Ohio gets 73 Billion cu. Ft. of natural gas and 4,900,000 barrels of crude oil in the most recent yearly total. ODNR has issued 567 permits in 21 counties (70% of permits went to Carroll, Jefferson, Columbiana and Harrison Counties). 27 rigs now operate here in 208 active drill sites of which 76 are actively producing via fracking.” ~ Jim O’Reilly, Professor of Law at the University of Cincinnati. O’Reilly is an expert on regulation issues.
Why We Work to Stop and Prevent Fracking and Injection Wells
There are studies and anecdotes of cases showing that fracking waste water is radioactive and contains carcinogenic chemicals, well water has been contaminated, people (including industry workers) have gotten sick from radiation and/or other pollutants from the process, farm animals and wildlife has died, radioactive brine has been released into rivers and spread on roads, lax safety procedures have resulted in earthquakes, it uses a heck of a lot of water, and might not even be better than coal in terms of greenhouse gas emissions due to faults inherent in the extraction and transmission process and well casing aging.
- From 1978 through 2012, 7,892,815,182 gallons of waste have been injected–almost 8 billion gallons. Portage County ranks #1 in the state with 1,161,722,898 gallons followed by Stark County at 746,372,676.
- The single well that has accepted the most waste to date is the Ronald F. Moran well in Licking County at 239,897,742 gallons.
- We have no idea how much of solid toxic, radioactive waste is going into our landfills because no one at the state level tracks that. The information out of PA shows over 220,000 tons of solids coming to Ohio in 2012–and that’s just from Pennsylvania.
Stopping Fracking with Faith
On Faith & Fracking is a new film by Doug Wood that calls on humanity to fulfill its role responsibly as steward of the Earth. Seven leaders of various faiths from across New York State ask individuals, congregations and peers to follow the teachings of religious traditions and therefore take up the fight against fracking: https://vimeo.com/58828810
On Faith & Fracking from Doug Wood on Vimeo.
January 10, 2012 NY Assembly Hearing on Fracking Regulations:
