EPA Fracking Study Missed Some 'Widespread' Impacts on Drinking Water

Fracking Does Cause ‘Widespread, Systemic’ Contamination of American’s Drinking Water

Josh Fox and Lee Ziesche | June 5, 2015

In a draft report five years in the making, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has confirmed that fracking does indeed contaminate drinking water, a fact the oil and gas industry has vehemently denied.

But instead of dismantling the industry’s “not one single case of groundwater contamination caused by fracking” refrain, the EPA decided to go with the misleading headline “there is no evidence fracking has led to widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water resources.”

It’s a puzzling conclusion since their study was conspicuously narrow (they did no new case studies, dropped three marquee cases that proved water contamination and dropped all air quality studies from the report).

Our Map of the Week shows 313 cases where families reported water contamination due to drilling in just six counties in North Eastern, Pennsylvania. Seems pretty widespread to me for a fracking and drilling campaign that’s still in its infancy. So far there’s been around 9,000 wells drilled in Pennsylvania. One report showed the potential for 200,000 – 600,000 fracked wells in the state.

Click Map to Enlarge. BH/NY Friends of Clean Air and Water CC-BY-NC

If the EPA is looking for proof of “widespread” contamination before declaring fracking unsafe, they may not have to wait long. The industries own data shows that 5 percent of fracking wells leak upon drilling and that number only grows over time.

What the EPA presented to the public yesterday was PR, not science and proof of the widespread, systemic contamination of our regulatory bodies by the oil and gas industry.

This isn’t the first time the EPA has released a report burying the science with a misleading headline that supports the Obama Administration’s pro-fracking policies rather than reveal the true dangers of fracking. It’s a disturbing trend we reported on extensively in GASLAND Part II with cases in Dimock, Pennsylvania; Parker County, Texas; and Pavilion, Wyoming.

In Dimock, Parker Country and Pavilion the EPA suddenly dropped water contamination cases when the science proved that fracking was the cause, going as far as slapping a press release claiming Dimock’s water was safe on a report that proved fracking had contaminated the water.

Read the full article at EcoWatch