Hydraulic Fracking

In today’s economy, natural gas and oil are used for energy, to heat and cool homes and provides fuel for cooking. Fossil fuel companies developed a process for natural gas called hydraulic fracturing. Hydraulic fracturing has become the most used technique in the United States’ to produce oil and natural gas. Hydraulic fracturing is also knows as fracking is a technique to produce natural gas and oil. Wells are built which involves the injection of water, sand and chemicals at high pressure into bedrock to produce natural gas and oil. The process creates small cracks or fractures in rock formations. The initiative of hydraulic fracturing will create jobs, the ability to produce natural gas and oil, and for the United States to be less dependent
The water is mixed with sand and chemicals to pump at high pressure into the shale rock. According to U.S Geological Survey (USGS) “This process is intended to create new fractures in the rock as well as increase the size, extend, and connectivity of existing permeability rocks like tight sandstone, shale, and some coal beds to increase oil and/or gas flow to a well from petroleum bearing rock formations”. The shale rocks contain the oil and gas. The shale rock will fracture from the fracturing fluid, which will hold the crack open and allow the natural gas to flow from the rock formation to the
During the process of hydraulic fracturing, the equipment used for drilling releases methane emissions. The EPA and other federal agencies are finding new technologies to reduce methane emissions. However, during the process of hydraulic fracturing the equipment used for drilling releases methane emissions. Methane is the most toxic greenhouse gas. According to Finkel and Hay, Volatile organic compounds and diesel particulate matter, for example, result in elevated air pollution concentrations that exceed US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) guidelines for both carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health risks” (p.