EPA changed course after gas company protested.

[Curmudgeoness]

When a man in a Fort Worth suburb reported his family's drinking water had begun bubbling like champagne, the federal government sounded an alarm: A company may have tainted their wells while drilling for natural gas.


At first, the Environmental Protection Agency believed the situation was so serious that it issued a rare emergency order in late 2010 that said at least two homeowners were in immediate danger from a well saturated with flammable methane. More than a year later, the agency rescinded its mandate and refused to explain why.

Now a confidential report obtained by The Associated Press and interviews with company representatives show that the EPA had scientific evidence against the driller, Range Resources, but changed course after the company threatened not to cooperate with a national study into a common form of drilling called hydraulic fracturing. Regulators set aside an analysis that concluded the drilling could have been to blame for the contamination.

http://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2013/01/16/epa-changed-course-after-oil-company-protested



So what this tells me is that there can be no studies of the safety of fracking without the cooperation of the drilling companies. And without studies, the frackers will be able to continue with the worn out meme that "there is no evidence" of problems with drinking water associated with fracking. Sounds like a catch 22----they threaten the EPA, and the EPA backs down so that they can "study" what the drillers want them to study.

I call horse shit.

[appleannie1]

1. It is HS. Here in PA we are even treated to commercials saying that water has always burned

and there are no chemicals in our water. All I know is I had good water for over 30 years and then they drilled a gas well across the road. I now take baths in black water and buy all water for cooking and consumption. All my sinks, toilets, dishwasher and washing machine are now a dark orange color and I take white laundry that I want to stay white to a laundromat in a nearby town. But it is all my imagination and I should be overjoyed that we are becoming "energy independent" and so many jobs have been created.

[Curmudgeoness]

3. That "job creation" thing is keeping a lot of people from listening

to what is obvious to anyone who is watching. I am sorry for you....there is so little you can do, and that is a sin. I read articles like this one, and I am astonished that even the til foil hat people are not scared of this. But they are defending the gas industry to the hilt.

As to that "energy independence", just wait until they get pipelines and cracker plants going, and have the ability to ship the gas overseas. We will be left with polluted water, at the least, and there will be no independence.

[defacto7]

2. How long...

I repeat... How long can the oil companies get away with this? It's right in their face. It's right in our face. It's like a freight train staring us down at 70 MPH.

You can't ignore stuff like this forever without something giving. It's not like it's subtle or something.

[Curmudgeoness]

4. No, it isn't subtle.

This article has been in every paper, from the Business Insider and the Wall Street Journal to the HuffPo. And it explains that Range Resources threatened the EPA into backing down. Now any thinking person would ask "why". Why do they have to threaten the EPA? There must have been something there.

The other question is "how the hell can some third rate company intimidate the EPA?" That is probably scarier.

[defacto7]

5. You've got that right.

Good point.