Brandon Krampert
In Motion Staff Writer
Joyce Wagner/In Motion
Speaker Emily Faulconer, who teaches chemistry at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, still tried to keep her Oct. 14 discussion balanced by talking about.
both the positive and negative effects of fracking. Otherwise known as hydraulic fracturing, Faulconer covered its historical development in the state of Florida; a new pipeline that may be built in Florida called the Sabal Trail pipeline; and other related topics.
“Traditional hydraulic fracturing, nicknamed fracking, is a process to extract hydrocarbons that are located deep underground. They drill a horizontal well, which is a new technique that takes about a week depending on the geology you’re trying to get through. Once they’re done with the drilling process then they do the actual fracking. Fracking takes one to seven days. They take a perforating gun that is a cylinder that they insert into the well that has explosive devices on it and they get it down to the depth and detonate it and they inject fracking fluids under really high pressures to allow natural gas to flow out of that well. The fracking fluid is about 90 percent water, 9.5 percent sand and .5 percent miscellaneous chemicals,” Faulconer said.
Faulconer then explained some of the benefits of natural gas extracted by fracturing. It burns cleaner than most fossil fuels, which is mostly methane an that it produces less carbon dioxide than burning coal or oil. There’s also been trends recently of commercial fleets and power plants switching over to natural gas and has been creating more jobs within the fracking industry and in the communities that they work in. The drawback is that methane is 23 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, which is detrimental to the environment.
Faulconer also explained some of the more problematic aspects of the process in the U.S. The fact is some companies withdraw water from local ground water reserves and there’s virtually no regulation on how much they can take. It takes three to five million gallons of water per frack that cannot be reused due to the chemicals present. Often, chemicals are considered trade secrets companies don’t have to disclose them to the public. There’s also a chance when fracking underground, cracks can spread upwards and contaminate drinking water reserves.
One well that has been fracked in Florida, the Orange Tree well, was also discussed, which is permitted by the Department of Environmental Protection in Collier County that is in close proximity to a number of sensitive areas such as the Florida Panther reserve and the Naples city water supply.
There’s been a number of wells that have been permitted by the DEP but the Orange Tree well is the only one that has been fracked in Florida.
The fracking process is a fairly new technique of extraction, and as such there is no legislation to regulate it for environmental reasons, companies just have to get the approval of the DEP.
Although, there have been attempts to pass legislation on this process. House Representative Ray Rodrigues of Lee county and the Agricultural & Natural Resources Subcommittee formed house bill 71 and 157 called the fractured chemical disclosure act which would require the DEP to establish an online chemical registry and require disclosure of the chemicals used in fracking allowing the DEP to make a distinction of what a trade secret is and what it isn’t. The bill died in May of this year and no other similar bills have been made in the Florida legislature.
In concluding the talk, Faulconer said, “As it’s being done right now, fracking is not safe by any stretch of the imagination. It can be safe enough if we have responsible operators and legislation to enforce action for irresponsible use of fracking. But no industrial process is going to be completely safe, there will be risks. But I personally wish we would go more towards renewables, I think Florida, the sunshine state should be leading the country in solar energy. We do have one of the largest solar infrastructure for residential use.”
A professor of geology and oceanography at DSC, Debra Woodall has a similar critique. “When you turn on your water and all of a sudden you can light it with a lighter and it didn’t happen that way before until they started fracking, that’s a little bizarre. Unless there’s some type of methane leak from a landfill, I don’t know what other sources it could be. But it seems to be a strong coincidence. I would not be for fracking but then again, I’m a proponent for doing away with fossil fuels anyways. It’s time to move on,” Woodall said.
The talk followed with a lively Q & A session and there were about 100 people in attendance.