BUSPH Environmental Health Students Argue for More Oversight of Hydraulic ‘Fracking’.
Three BU School of Public Health students, working with their environmental health and law instructors, have published a paper arguing that federal oversight is needed to protect the public from potential health risks from chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, a process used to extract natural gas from shale formations.
In the paper, published in a special issue of the journal New Solutions, the students and their environmental health and law instructor, Assistant Professor Madeleine Scammell, co-teaching with attorney Gene Benson of Boston-based Alternatives for Community and Environment, exposed gaps in the regulations governing hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking.
“The current status of disclosure prevents the public, lawmakers, and scientists from understanding possible health and environmental effects, and also prevents proper monitoring of chemical contamination as a result of hydraulic fracturing operations,” they wrote.
“We believe federal regulations are essential to ensure that air and water quality will not be compromised, minimum requirements for chemical disclosure will be standardized across all states, and responsible parties will be held accountable if the natural environment or public health is harmed.”
Under current regulations, companies are not mandated by federal regulations to disclose the identities or quantities of chemicals used during hydraulic fracturing on private or public lands. States have begun to regulate hydraulic fracturing fluids by mandating chemical disclosure, but those laws have shortcomings, including nondisclosure of proprietary or “trade secret” mixtures, insufficient penalties for reporting inaccurate or incomplete information, and timelines that allow for after-the-fact reporting, the student authors found.
Advances in natural gas recovery technologies and attractive prices have spurred a modern day “gas rush,” leading to a 48 percent increase in U.S. shale gas production from 2006 to 2010, the students reported. High-volume hydraulic fracturing is a relatively new drilling technology that makes it easier to reach underground natural gas reserves.
Fracking injects a mixture of water, sand and chemicals into rock formations at high pressure to force out oil and natural gas. The technique has stirred controversy, with proponents arguing that it creates a novel source of cheap, domestic energy that may help to replace “dirty” energy sources such as coal-fired plants, and critics concerned about the threats to groundwater contamination and human health posed by the use of chemicals in the process.
Fluid additives include acids, gelling agents and corrosion inhibitors, some of which pose known risks to health. In one case in Wyoming in 2011, EPA inspectors found high concentrations of benzene, xylenes and other petroleum compounds in groundwater, indicating contamination.
A 2011 Congressional probe found that a dozen energy companies may have violated environmental rules by injecting diesel into the ground without permits. That report found that 32 million gallons of diesel fuel were injected into the ground between 2005 and 2009, in apparent violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act.
In 2012, the US Geological Service released a report identifying natural gas in the Hartford Shale of Western and Central Massachusetts, prompting talks among local environmental groups and legislators about fracking in Massachusetts.
The BUSPH students found that federal reporting of fracturing chemicals is “completely voluntary,” raising questions about the accuracy and completeness of reporting. Two legislative bills in the last five years, and one proposed rule by the Obama administration, attempted to amend federal exemptions of hydraulic fracturing and introduce provisions mandating the disclosure of the chemical composition of fluid. But all three attempts failed.
Several states, including Texas and Pennsylvania, have enacted fracturing disclosure laws. But the students found that many of those requirements have “significant loopholes” that allow for incomplete reporting. In addition, some states have faced budget cuts that have reduced funding for monitoring and inspections of gas and oil wells.
On a federal level, the report concludes: “While there is some movement toward regulating hydraulic fracturing, and mandating chemical disclosure appears to be high on the list of priorities for environmental and community groups as well as some federal legislators, the process of changing federal regulations is slow and will continue to be challenged by industry and some lawmakers.”
The students argued that in order to create an enforceable regulatory program, “Lawmakers should first have knowledge of the chemicals used in these processes, and then determine whether the chemicals require regulation to protect public health and safety and the environment.”
Students who co-authored the paper were: Alexis Maule, Colleen Makey and Isaac Burrows. They had written two separate papers on fracking for a course called Environmental Health Law, Science & Policy. Scammell and Benson worked with them to develop one publishable paper.
“I am proud of the students,” Scammell said. “They successfully identified and examined one aspect of a gigantic topic, pinpointing key public health and policy issues that are highly relevant around the country today.”
Submitted by: Lisa Chedekel
chedekel@bu.edu