Hydraulic fracturing is a proven process that has been safely used to complete more than a million wells in the United States, and it is one of the processes tightly regulated by Pennsylvania’s DEP. Some people think that hydraulic fracturing creates large holes in the rock formation that could destabilize the formation. It does not. The process creates fissures, just millimeters wide, that allow gas molecules to flow from the rock, into the well bore and up to the surface. Because the rock is very “tight” and is under considerable pressure, these fissures are small and contained within the target formation. Therefore, the integrity of the formation remains intact.
U.S. Energy Sec. Moniz and countless other officials and experts have confirmed that hydraulic fracturing has never contaminated groundwater. The Associated Press recently reported that “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.”
