Home> >> Earthquakes and fracking> Debunking Gasland> Summing up>
Debunking Gasland
To return to the origin of these web pages, the “Gasland” documentary by Josh Fox has caused concern over fracking in New Zealand.
For the record, fracking in New Zealand is nothing like how this technology is portrayed in Gasland.
Gasland is controversial because of contested allegations of environmental damage (to drinking water, air quality and, ultimately, to human health), and of a cover-up (gas companies refusing to be interviewed, and authorities turning a blind eye).
The US gas industry provided a rebuttal of Gasland, rebutted in turn by Josh Fox and colleagues.
Within the above, there were spectacular scenes of people lighting fire to their tapwater which official investigations found had nothing to do with fracking. What actually happened is that poorly-sealed water bores for the affected residents were drilled through shallow coal seams, and methane naturally occurring within the coal seams leaked from them into the drinking water.
While Fox asserts that “other chemicals” were also found in the tap water, no evidence has been offered to argue that these chemicals stemmed from gas drilling and fracking, or that any of the chemicals used in gas drilling or fracking contributed to poor water quality. While a report for the European Parliament refers to instances of thermogenic methane in drinking water, the inference being it came from fracked rock formations, such methane would also come from natural, and non-fracked coal seams.
As an additional consideration, many parts of the US where fracking occurs also have a long history of oil and gas development with drilling of wells going back over more than 100 years. As evidence, a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences determined that methane had got into the tapwater but had not detected the presence of fracking chemicals.
Be that as it may, it is more certain that air quality issues have arisen in the US as a result of some of the practices used for disposal of recovered fracking fluids, practices that are not legal in New Zealand, and which involve chemicals not used in New Zealand.
Exploding the myths
Setting fire to the tapwater looks spectacular but this scene from "Gasland" had nothing to do with fracking. An official investigation found that methane had got into the drinking water from a poorly-sealed water bore drilled through shallow coal seams.
Josh Fox's documentary "Gasland" is fraught with stories that do not stack up on closer examination. That undermines the real concerns raised, e.g. over air quality from waste water disposal practices in the US that are illegal in New Zealand.
Apparently more than 500 chemicals are used in fracking. In reality, 7-12 chemical additives would be used in any one operation, depending on the geology, none of which are toxic in the concentrations used.
In response to concern over the vast amount of water used in fracking, the reality is that it depends. In New Zealand, a single operation could require 300,000 litres of water. That looks a lot but is minute compared to water use in farming, pulp and paper mills, and food processing.