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Water contaminated with some of the chemicals found in drinking water and fracking wastewater has been shown to affect hormone levels in mice:
More than 15 million Americans live within a one-mile radius of unconventional oil and gas (UOG) operations. UOGs combine directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," to release natural gas from underground rock. Scientific studies, while ongoing, are still inconclusive on the potential long-term effects fracturing has on human development. Today, researchers at the University of Missouri released a study that is the first of its kind to link exposure to chemicals released during hydraulic fracturing to adverse reproductive and developmental outcomes in mice. Scientists believe that exposure to these chemicals also could pose a threat to human development.
"Researchers have previously found that endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) mimic or block hormones — the chemical messengers that regulate respiration, reproduction, metabolism, growth and other biological functions," said Susan C. Nagel, Nagel, an associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology and women's health in the School of Medicine. "Evidence from this study indicates that developmental exposure to fracking and drilling chemicals may pose a threat to fertility in animals and potentially people. Negative outcomes were observed even in mice exposed to the lowest dose of chemicals, which was lower than the concentrations found in groundwater at some locations with past oil and gas wastewater spills."
Researchers mixed 23 oil and gas chemicals in four different concentrations to reflect concentrations ranging from those found in drinking water and groundwater to concentrations found in industry wastewater. The mixtures were added to drinking water given to pregnant mice in the laboratory until they gave birth. The female offspring of the mice that drank the chemical mixtures were compared to female offspring of mice in a control group that were not exposed. Mice exposed to drilling chemicals had lower levels of key hormones related to reproductive health compared to the control group.
Adverse Reproductive and Developmental Health Outcomes Following Prenatal Exposure to a Hydraulic Fracturing Chemical Mixture in Female C57Bl/6 Mice (open, DOI: 10.1210/en.2016-1242) (DX)
(Score: 2) by edIII on Wednesday August 31 2016, @06:58PM
It's not a trade secret, and it's not related to the fluids. In any case, I already know what is in it, as explained by the engineers present. I'm not worried about fracking fluid composition anymore than I'm worried about being exposed to dangerous radiation from medical materials. As I stated, it's a CLOSED system. That fluid is as dangerous as anything else being transported, so all things being equal, I don't give a fuck about it. There are well established ways to deal with the fluid, and under normal conditions, it is isolated and controllable.
We get to keep our well data secret, especially 3D seismic and our understandings of the geological formations. Basically, anything related to information regarding hydrocarbons underground is protected by national security. You have no way around that, and no, there are no exceptions to it. Of course, please feel free to prove me wrong. I would truly love that, and would instantly be filing thousands of requests to gain access to all of their 3D seismic.
If we both agree on the search for the truth, then the truth is readily available. Just shoot the fucking executives in the head to remove the deliberate obstructions (or with a miracle get corrupt legislators to allow it), perform the data collection, analyze the data, and the determine the "health" of the water tables.
With technology at our disposal, it's as simple as looking. It's not a climate change debate (although none of it is debatable anyways) where there are variables and math to argue about.
Blow some shit up, listen to the sound waves, and see like mother fucking Batman. Simplistic, but not wholly inaccurate.
I've made no generalizations at all. The industry has a well established track record of skirting regulations for profit. How would you know if the industry is fraccing at 1000 ft? Just curious, but where are you getting your information about the various formations, the chosen production zones, location of perforations, etc.?
Again, you seem under the mistaken impression that I'm asking for a moratorium on fraccing, or the complete banning of it. Nothing could be further from the truth, and we still need access to natural gas at a minimum for the foreseeable future. I don't object to deliberately leaving oil underground anymore, as long as renewables start taking off to meet our needs.
What I'm tired of, and what we will all rise up to kill the rest of you for, is the skirting of regulations and the utter destruction of the environment for profit. To that end, shut the fuck up about fraccing. Stop talking about as if you know jack shit, because you do the rest of us (your actual brothers and sisters) an extreme disservice by propping these evil people up.
There is no way on God's green Earth that a movement to stop fraccing could have ever occurred if the fracs were done right. It would have remained an obscure technology that almost nobody would have heard of.
When there is smoke, there *may* be fire. When there is huge volumes of smoke everywhere, then you're just a fucking moron for saying there can't be fire. Occam's Razor alone dictates that they are lying through their teeth about being safe.
You are a true moron aren't you? Ridiculous posturing? Hardly. Water is the primary and overriding requirement to life as we know it, and life that can support us. Would you like to speak to other scientists about this?
We don't scan the cosmos for hydrocarbons to look for life, we scan for water.
Fresh water is becoming scarce. Don't go full retard on us here today and try to claim that the majority of our water is fresh and accessible, when the reality is that it's becoming increasingly difficult. Look to the recent article about the water underground in India and how we are increasing salinity and arsenic concentrations.
LOL!!!!!!
That's the FIRST fucking thing you said that made any sense at all, and was accurate.
Except.... there is very very little proper fracking going on, corrupt regulators are everywhere, and all of the data is obscured from public review by national security laws. If there were proper fracks everywhere, nobody could be complaining about damage to water tables. Go ahead and try. Call all of those people liars, and all of the tests of their water fraudulent.
As I stated before, and I will state again, I've believed that all fracs were proper fracs. Why would these engineers destroy nature and harm society? I couldn't wrap my head around it either considering the massive consequences. The truth is different, and no proper frac requires that much water continuously.
Stupid fucker. That's why you need to die and get the fuck out of our way. You're just as bad as the rest of them, and we can't move forward while your full-retard apologist ass keeps allowing them the exact same environment to conduct their illicit activities.
Burn in hell.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 01 2016, @04:04PM
We get to keep our well data secret, especially 3D seismic and our understandings of the geological formations. Basically, anything related to information regarding hydrocarbons underground is protected by national security. You have no way around that, and no, there are no exceptions to it. Of course, please feel free to prove me wrong. I would truly love that, and would instantly be filing thousands of requests to gain access to all of their 3D seismic.
Who is "we" here? If it is "the industry", then FOIA doesn't apply to private entities. If it's the government, then the information is probably already public domain.
There is no way on God's green Earth that a movement to stop fraccing could have ever occurred if the fracs were done right. It would have remained an obscure technology that almost nobody would have heard of.
That's nonsense. There are plenty of environmental groups strongly opposed to any fossil fuel production and use for reasons that have nothing to do with safety. My view is that fracking really is opposed because it extends our period of oil and natural gas production by a significant amount of time and quantity which is considered in itself an evil. I believe here the legal principle of "deny everything" applies. That is resist fracking 100% even when you have no scientific or legal basis for doing so.
I've made no generalizations at all. The industry has a well established track record of skirting regulations for profit. How would you know if the industry is fraccing at 1000 ft?
Claim no generalizing is going on and then turn around and in the very next two sentences generalize about "the industry". A good portion of the industry doesn't frack at all, much less frack at 1000 feet. If fracking at an unsafe depth is happening, then there is someone that can be fined and punished. It's not some generic, nebulous "the industry" doing that.
Further, since when did it become my job to stop unsafe fracking? Where's my budget for this? If you want to give me an appropriate budget and appropriate legal authority, then sure, I can "know" this stuff and address it.
Water is the primary and overriding requirement to life as we know it, and life that can support us.
No, that would be gaseous O2. You can go without water for days. You can go without oxygen for maybe ten minutes. But we don't hear about running out of air, eh? Just because we need something doesn't make it scarce.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Thursday September 01 2016, @10:30PM
This is why you've gone full retard. You're actually arguing with me over the extreme biological need for water, not just in our bodies, but in nature around us. That's not something that can be argued.
God you are a stupid, stupid, fucker.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 01 2016, @11:59PM
You're actually arguing with me over the extreme biological need for water, not just in our bodies, but in nature around us.
I'm not. That should tell any other reader who the "stupid fucker" really is here. I've never disputed the need. What I have done is point out something that should be obvious. The scarcity matters as well.
Sure, ecosystems need water. But there's plenty of water in the world and rain, an enormous natural distribution system to deliver that water. Which means we can do a hell of a lot more harm to the environment than a little ground water contamination and still have that water distribution.
Your only concern to date has been somebody fracking at 1000 feet. Which probably isn't good for ground water contamination, but is a far cry from destroying ecosystems which a) aren't very dependent on ground water, b) aren't that harmed by ground water contamination, and c) are contaminated only near the source of the ground water contamination. Sure, sounds like something to regulate, but you are a long ways from showing the threat you've claimed.