CBS “60 Minutes” Fracking Segment “Shaleionaires”
November 15, 2010 5 Comments
View the CBS “60 Minutes” Segment on Hydro-fracking
Initial Comments on the interview:
On the Positive Side:
- Millions of viewers who may not have been paying attention to this issue were able to see the imposition of huge, industrial drilling pads, compressors, pipelines upon peaceful rural landscapes and overwhelming homes, farms and even cities and towns. These images showed that: the well pads are huge and highly industrialized; the gas industry sites well pads right next to homes; there are real people living near these gas wells and these people are deeply concerned about adverse health effects; there are real people who used to have good water but who don’t any more thanks to nearby gas drilling; cows who drink fracking fluid fall over dead in their pasture–not just one or two cows who maybe drank a lot or were sickly to begin with, but ALL of the cows. Imagine that you knew very little about gas drilling and you were presented with all of these images. What would your general impression be? Would you be inclined, after seeing these images, to trust good old Aubrey, who sits at his nice, safe desk and callously admits that accidents will happen? My guess is that there were a fair number of viewers who were absolutely horrified, particularly if they also happened to watch the CSI episode on fracking. Maybe they will question whether they would be able to live with this industry in their area since it was pointed out that shale formations are found in 34 states.
- Two farmers from LA boasting of their “god-given” wealth, new Cadillacs, new jobs in the area. No mention of the effect on their neighbors who suffer from contaminated water, air and loss of the use of their land, damage to local infrastructure like roads and bridges.
On the Negative Side
- Too many of Aubrey McClendon’s (Chesapeake CEO) statements were not challenged such as his assertion that because the fracking takes place at 2-5 miles below the water table there would be no effect on water sources.
- No mention of surface spills, problems with cementing the well to seal it from aquifers as they drill through the aquifer, numerous natural fractures that can open under pressure, tens of thousands of abandoned wells that can provide a conduit from the shale formations to the aquifers.
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Sixty Lame Minutes. By James Howard Kunstler on November 15, 2010 9:13 AM
So, last night CBS hauled Aubrey McClendon, CEO of Chesapeake Energy, on board their flagship Sunday infotainment vehicle, 60 Minutes, to blow a mighty wind up America’s ass (as they say in professional PR circles). America is lately addicted to lying to itself, and 60 Minutes has become the “go-to” patsy for funneling disinformation into an already hopelessly confused, wishful, delusional, US public.
McClendon told the credulous Leslie Stahl and the huge viewing audience that America “has two Saudi Arabia’s of gas.” Now, you know immediately that at least half the viewers misconstrued this statement to mean that we have two Saudi Arabia’s of gasoline. Translation: don’t worry none about driving anywhere you like, or having to get some tiny little pansy-ass hybrid whatchamacallit car to do it in, and especially don’t pay no attention to them “green” sumbitches on the sidelines trying to sell you some kind of peak oil story…. It also prepared the public to support whatever Mr. McClendon’s company wants to do, because he says his company will free America from its slavery to OPEC. By the way, CBS never clarified these parts of the story by the end of the show. Read the whole story
GDACC 
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Do you realize that every oil and gas well ever drilled, has gone through the water aquifers ? Has that not dawned on you ? Whether its oil or nat gas does not matter. As McClendon said, the aquifers are near the surface.
All states ( who regulate drilling and fracing ) require surface casing and most require it to be set to 2000 feet of depth. And that has been successful for the past 100 years or so, in protecting aquifers. If it were not completely safe, we would have known about it a long long time ago.
Oil wells have been fraced for the past 60 years. Just because a well may be turned horizontal at a deep depth, has no bearing on the point where the aquifers are located.
Fracing pressures are the same whether they fracing a vertical oil well or a horizontal gas well.
And the rock formation being fractured is far too deep and separated by thousands of feet of pure bedrock.
The CBS piece failed , in not going to STATE regulators and talking to them about the incidents they reported on. There was no mention of state regulation. There was no mention of the natural occurence of methane in wells in Pennsylvania, which state regulators there could’ve confirmed.
The following is from Carl Arnold. I think is worth considering even
if one decides to proceed with regulation and mitigation of unconventional
gas extraction by hydraulic fracturing.
• No regulation can prevent the heavy metals and radioactive substances
loosened by this process from coming up with the gas.
• No regulation can prevent 30% to 70% of the toxic fracking chemicals from
remaining underground.
• No regulation can prevent the extraordinary squandering of fresh water —
5.5 million gallons average per well — 100% of which becomes contaminated, and
contaminated permanently. And this in an era of diminishing availability of
fresh water in the US and worldwide.
• No regulation, in this era of economic plummet, can magically find the
billions needed to construct waste treatment plants that might be able to
filter the toxic chemicals, heavy metals and radioactive materials from
fracking waste.
• No regulation can avoid the risk, eg, of earthquakes from disposal via
injection wells or the potential of leakage from them. This has already
happened in Ashtabula, Ohio, and authorities are presently investigating a
series of earthquakes in Arkansas and West Virginia that are suspected to be
caused by fracking fluid disposal in injection wells.
• No regulation can dispel the myth of “energy independence.” At present,
Japanese, Indian, European and Canadian corporations own significant pieces of
US drilling companies. Thus, some profit already goes overseas. So will the gas
if it’s more profitable to export than to sell domestically.
• No regulation can predict or control the underground migration of toxic
plumes. They’re already under way.
• No regulation can prevent toxic chemicals from being used — which raises
the issue of enforcement. Even while New York State is planning to issue
permits to frack in state forests, the governor has reduced the Department of
Environmental Conservation’s budget. In any case, the 16 (give or take)
inspectors now on staff is a number laughably inadequate to deal with what the
industry has planned.
Please bear in mind the long-established record of the oil & gas corporations.
For decades they’ve been — and continue to be — rapacious, sloppy and
inhumane, whether it’s the Ecuadorian Amazon, the Niger Delta, Indonesia,
Prince William Sound or the Gulf of Mexico.
The White House changed the original conclusion of the 2004 EPA energy study to
condone fracking and enable the exemption of the O&G corporations from at least
seven federal environmental protection acts. Considering that the Obama
administration wants China and India to replace coal with hydrofracked gas
(http://www.alternet.org/story/147994/), presumably having bought our
technology, the new EPA study presently in the works may suffer an equivalent
fate. Certainly we cannot rely on a corporate administration to save us.
That’s a superficial overview of how regulation is impotent in making
hydrofracking safe.
There is only one way to render this practice safe: Ban it.
Outright. Unequivocally. Forever.
That may sound extreme, but it is extremely rational. Anything less dooms us.
Carl Arnold
member, Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter
Gas Drilling Task Force
The Sierra Club …………….hahahaha ………… yeah, now there is unbiased source.
If these had their way, you will be riding a bicycle to work.
Earthquakes !!!!!
Hahahahahaha
This is total and complete political spin that is not grounded in reality. Sierra Club is opposed to anyone using fossil fuels. That is the agenda, to obstruct the development of any new source of fossil fuel.
And I won’t waste my time. Wells have been fraced for over 60 years. Enough said.
And you, are guilty of NIMBY’ism to the highest order. Shame on you. To work to prevent our country from accessing this vital resource, all for some emotionally based fears you have, that are not grounded in reality.
60 years is not a long time in the scheme of things when you think that these chemicals have been under us for millions and millions of years…so all of this back and forth is just throwing random facts around…i want to know the truth, what IS safe and what IS not…i’m tired of lies, i think both sides lie…both side present the fact that support their veiwpoint…so who do you believe and where can you get the straight pure facts.
the one thing that really chagrins me is the fact that i KNOW there are safe sources of energy available, but somehow they have been quashed…no meter on it? can’t charge the public on an ongoing basis? well then, it will never make it to market…but there ARE free forms of energy and they do NOT require us to use pollutants either. just google free energy…and egypt, let the archeologists explore the giza plateau and see what information the ancients left for us…mankind has had these mysteries solved before and we can learn from the past…why is this information being kept so secret..would it bankrupt the oil industry and throw the global economy into a tailspin if it were known? I JUST WANT TO KNOW THE TRUTH!!!
one thing i want to now is HOW SAFE REALLY??? is it to live near this stuff, and what is is really doing to our environment…isn’t there any unbiased place for information, or are we just stuck with the “science” fed to us by whichever side financed the study.
i have no candidate in this race…just ME, my fellow humans and the creatures of earth, and yes, even this planet does matter to me…we are all important, so…i’m not for or against either side, i only want the truth…does anyone KNOW the truth?