Naturally-occurring methane in private water wells across the Commonwealth is a longstanding issue, dating back decades before shale development, which began in 2004. For example, a recent peer-reviewed study in the journal “Groundwater” found that naturally occurring methane is abundant in northeastern Pennsylvania.
The fact is that hydraulic fracturing is a proven process that has been safely used to complete more than a million wells in the United States and has never contaminated groundwater, as confirmed by U.S. Energy Sec. Moniz and countless other officials and experts. Recently, in fact, the Associated Press reported, “A landmark federal study on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, shows no evidence that chemicals from the natural gas drilling process moved up to contaminate drinking water aquifers at a western Pennsylvania drilling site.”
