Ars technica: New York state to ban fracking for natural gas
Today, the health commissioner of the state of New York, Howard Zucker, announced that he has completed a study into the health impacts of hydraulic fracturing for the recovery of natural gas. Although there are few demonstrated health risks, Zucker noted that there are a great many uncertainties about the process, and these make it impossible to design intelligent regulations that minimize potential risks. As a result, the state will ban the practice indefinitely.
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(Score: 5, Insightful) by sigma on Friday December 19 2014, @06:03AM
Although there are few demonstrated health risks
This is a bit disingenuous. While there's clearly a need for more research, epidemiological studies have demonstrated clear correlation between fracking and health risks.
(Score: 2) by digitalaudiorock on Friday December 19 2014, @03:06PM
The fact that benzene is ever involved should give anyone pause. I mean seriously...benzene?? Wasn't that banned from like every safe workplace decades ago?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by urza9814 on Friday December 19 2014, @03:48PM
My guess is that's their way of saying that the problem isn't necessarily fracking, but the companies doing it.
My understanding is that it's perfectly possible to have relatively safe fracking wells. Without chemicals and gas leaking into water supplies and all that nastiness. The problem is just that the majority of the companies doing it cut corners. A lot. They lobby to get themselves exempted from environmental regulations, and then even the few regulations that do still apply they violate constantly when they know they can get away with it.
Fracking companies and their lobbyists love to talk about theory when safety concerns come up. They're probably in this guy's office every week showing how fracking is *theoretically* perfectly safe and could never ever harm anyone in any way. If he comes out and says categorically that fracking is unsafe, they'll spin up the PR machine to "debunk the myth". So instead he's directly saying that he accepts all that theory, but he's concerned about the actual implementation. That's a lot harder for them to fight, because the implementation sucks and they know it.
(Score: 2) by EQ on Friday December 19 2014, @03:59PM
What ever happened to "correlation is not causation"? Neither defending or opposing the fracking ban, just asking if that's relevant to this as a scientific discussion.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 19 2014, @04:05PM
While there's clearly a need for more research, epidemiological studies have demonstrated clear correlation between fracking and health risks.
Then regulate it. There are plenty of places showing how it can be done in a safe manner.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by HiThere on Friday December 19 2014, @09:33PM
The examples known of regulated industries are not encouraging. Regulatory capture is frequent. There appears to be a strong desire to ignore safety regulations whenever feasible, and an extremely strong desire to keep what they are doing secret. The last time I checked the fracking companies were as secretive as to the contents of their lubricating fluids as a perfumer.
So the expectation has to be that:
a) they'll use large amounts of money to engage in regulatory capture
and
b) they still won't want to follow the regulations, and will actively resist the regulations being enforced.
This does not make me think banning the process is a bad idea.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday December 20 2014, @11:26AM
(Score: 5, Informative) by zeigerpuppy on Friday December 19 2014, @06:06AM
Fracking is the new oil rush in the US. But an analysis of the production curves and total availability of gas serves to point to an investment bubble that is not sustainable in the longer term ( http://www.theoildrum.com/node/7087 [theoildrum.com] ).
In addition, studies in Australia have suggested that the emissions of methane from fracking may be a significant contributor to global warming ( http://m.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/harvard-fracking-study-rings-methane-alarm-bells-in-australia-20131126-2y87s.html [smh.com.au] ).
These issues together with the significant concerns that companies refuse to release the details of chemicals used in the process mean that a precautionary approach is an appropriate response to the expansion of this type of drilling.
Ground water resources are increasingly important to agriculture and urban water supply and cannot be cleaned once polluted by the leaching of fracking chemicals. There is insufficient study determining the severity of contamination.
The broader concern that these more marginal extraction methods also prolong our fossil fuel dependence and have poor energy return on energy investment (EROEI) also need further exploration.
Prepare for the backlash from the financiers currently fleecing investors on this repeat of the the oil rush mentality.
(Score: 4, Informative) by frojack on Friday December 19 2014, @06:36AM
Companies do not REFUSE to release the content of the "chemicals" used in the process.
These thing are well documented.
Literally 20 seconds on google would provide you lists.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_fracturing#Fracturing_fluids_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]
http://www.colorado.edu/news/releases/2014/11/12/major-class-fracking-chemicals-no-more-toxic-common-household-substances [colorado.edu]
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Informative) by zeigerpuppy on Friday December 19 2014, @07:16AM
Also see these articles for counterpoints:
http://theconversation.com/without-full-disclosure-of-accidents-and-chemicals-used-fracking-risks-remain-unknown-30065 [theconversation.com]
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fracking-companies-fight-epa-s-proposed-chemical-disclosure-rules/ [scientificamerican.com]
Looks like the disclosure is less than complete.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by shortscreen on Friday December 19 2014, @07:15AM
New York's energy utility NYSEG consumes a lot of natural gas to power the grid. It's one of the top three sources (along with nuclear and hydroelectric, I forget the actual percentages for each). In other words, the price of gas is competitive with other energy sources, despite the lack of hydraulic fracturing in NY.
Now let's imagine that the frackers in neighboring states do their thing until the gas is gone, the price rises due to tightening supply, and those states don't turn into toxic wastelands. Then NY could lift their ban, and the gas could be recovered and sold off for a higher dollar value.
Or, maybe those states do turn into toxic wastelands as a result of fracking, in which case NY can point and laugh at them.
The only benefit to jumping on the fracking bandwagon at this point would be short term jobs and short term profits (of course these things are loved by many)
(Score: 1) by anubi on Friday December 19 2014, @08:49AM
and the price of gas skyrockets again.
Right now, its advantageous to get the gas somewhere else.
I still wonder if fracking is a long term solution or just a fart in the geological scope of things.
I still strongly get the idea its just a fart but being blown up to epic proportions for political reasons to crater the Russian economy.
While they transfer the wealth from middle class Americans to the 0.1 percenters, who burn about the same fuel no matter how much money they have.
I get the strong idea petroleum prices are being held low by demand destruction resulting from inability to pay.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Thexalon on Friday December 19 2014, @02:23PM
The dramatic drop in the price of oil has everything to do with the Saudis deciding to help the US with crushing Russia's economy, and very little to do with demand for oil and gas (which hasn't changed all that much recently). That is causing all sorts of trouble for Uncle Vlad in Moscow, and probably is motivated by their involvement in Ukraine and Syria.
Never underestimate the power of economics in international affairs.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by gmrath on Saturday December 20 2014, @12:35AM
Suspect that the Saudis are more concerned with keeping market share and crushing US-based oil production. Driving crude oil prices low enough will cause many small and medium-sized domestic producers to go out of business. What could have been a step towards real energy independence for North America will be eliminated for some time to come.
(Score: 2) by Yog-Yogguth on Sunday December 21 2014, @11:59AM
Do you really think so? I don't, to me it simply doesn't jive with what is happening. If it hadn't been for the fact that Russia isn't making any waves (an illustrative example would be South Stream which is an EU problem, Russia simply accepted the EU stance and switched to Turkey) …if it wasn't for that and all the rest I would have suspected (silly as it might seem) it to be entirely the other way around (Saudi Arabia helping Russia) considering the facts and the results as they already are.
Either way it is strange though, I mean if it's the doing of the US government then doesn't the US government realize the Russians are being paid in US dollars for a lot of their oil and gas? Well I would say they must know, so why are they committing suicide on purpose? Because isn't that exactly what they're doing?
Still who else could it be? No one speculating in oil benefits much either, it's a dead market flirting with market collapse, the US and western oil industry (which is most of it including the Middle East and OPEC) is bleeding value at ridiculous amounts, all their shares are currently massively overvalued just like the dollar, they are already in danger of bankruptcy and insolvency. Not only the Saudis but the entire OPEC has it's back to the wall and no choice but to keep up or their nations go up in flames.
And then people talk about Russia being in trouble lol, Russia (along with China) is in heaven compared to everyone else. But they aren't doing anything except hanging on, they don't have the kind of clout needed to cause this kind of mess: China is a big importer (not supplier) although slightly down (nowhere near enough to explain anything) and Russia is steady as ever (although they have opened up the possibility of reducing supply which would help everyone).
Back to the US government then but as I will show it really makes no sense.
Combine dollar payments with a weakening ruble and you get an awful lot of rubles for your dollar so the impact on Russia will always be far more modest than the impact on economies that have a more even dollar currency ratio (and that of course includes the US where the ratio is 1). Russia gets a chance to jump at diversification and non-dollar trade for imports while the US in particular forces its companies into the ground because neither shale oil or any ordinary US oil companies can profit at these prices, not even Saudi Arabia profits right now; so they're all selling at loss while any company or business case getting used to cheap oil will go extinct in a flash. And when the dollar fails the Russians can easily and immediately jump to demanding payments in other currencies as they already have everything in place for that with their main customers except the EU which is doomed no matter what (and not because setting up similar deals with European nations won't be fast but because they won't be able to pay).
Ukraine didn't join the EU¹, the EU joined Ukraine! :o
¹ It's a joke, I'm perfectly aware they're nowhere close to joining the EU as an actual member.
So right now Russians with spare money (and it doesn't take much) are on a spending spree both for anything they can buy in rubles (current inventories of foreign luxury goods being stripped with no demand left for anything imported at new prices which will add on to the western sanctions that have been boomeranging back onto western businesses from day one) as well as anything more or less sensible they can invest dollars in like foreign property (because they know what is coming later and that any surviving US and western companies are in for a massive backlash when the oil prices jump, the longer the low prices last the steeper and higher the eventual adjustment will be and the less valuable dollars will be).
So is this all a ploy to bail out oil companies? That won't actually work because the dollar is already vastly overvalued and the shock will make it adjust sharply so there would be little if anything at all to bail out with. Maybe they'll simply expropriate foreign gold reserves in the US, but then you can wave goodbye to Europe forever and say hello to new nuclear enemies. Or is it a ploy to introduce so much social strife and unrest that all kinds of martial law has to be introduced? That could easily trigger civil war (nearly anything could these days, about ten people have already given it a go during the last few years) so maybe that's where the profits are meant to come from but it doesn't sound like much of a convincing business case either. Even outright slaughter and mass expropriation (murder and theft) doesn't sound like it would be profitable (all one is really doing is to destroy ones core market).
It won't even matter if the US is dumping oil prices because they've got fusion power up their sleeves (and it would still all be a god damn awfully stupid way to do things even if that should be the case): they're still destroying an entire industry.
If they are behind it.
I think I've shown that it really makes no sense for the US to do this and even if they aren't doing it all the strange cheerleading going on from the US also makes no sense. If anyone has an idea on how it would make sense please speak up. There's no Pyhrric victory: “only” a global firestorm.
So to finish on a more personal note plenty of people think 2014 has been a “busy” year but wow imagine a possible or maybe even likely 2015 where France exits NATO (because of all the US torture), the UK exits the EU (or run for your life it will get bloody, and what happens if there's a throwback to the insane 70ies UK energy situation?), particularly Germany and maybe also the Netherlands have velvet revolutions (might also easily exit NATO and the EU), and the US implodes yet again financially this time over “bad oil”? I mean I can see how it could happen yet it will still surprise me; I was convinced we were all in for at least a 50 year long fall (if it would ever end) dragging down the entirety of humanity. Fuck now I almost feel hopeful, and that is a very bad sign.
(Score: 1) by Lukehasnoname on Friday December 19 2014, @07:31PM
PA and other states should (if only it were legal) prescribe a law that only states that have a reciprocal production policy regarding fracking can buy fracked gas.
Maybe the NIMBY would disappear when New Yorkers are freezing in the cold.
Also, maybe that would get NY State to invest in nuclear.
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Friday December 19 2014, @08:01PM
PA and other states should (if only it were legal) prescribe a law that only states that have a reciprocal production policy regarding fracking can buy fracked gas.
I suspect New York would have greater economic pull in any struggle of this sort, particularly if they combined with other states that banned fracking.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 21 2014, @03:05AM
Why would PA want to force NY (or any other state) to allow fracking? The additional competition would lower the price that producers in PA could get for their gas...and it's pretty clear that the frackers run the PA government (the parts of the government that are in charge of regulation of fracking in PA).