Stop Fracking 'In the Dark,' Say Biologists

In the nonrenewable energy department, shale gas is just so hot right now. But a study published this week argues that the process by which it's extracted is quite harmful to the environment and full of unknowns. Extensive research hasn't been done yet to determine the extent of fracking's ecological damage, both potential and otherwise, and energy companies keeping their shale gas-related chemical lists and spills a secret isn't helping. Despite the secrecy, scientists can already tell the whole process is pretty bad and needs major overhaul, along with additional research.

The report, published in the journalFrontiers in Ecology and the Environment and authored by eight conservation biologists from various organizations and universities including Canada's Simon Frasier University and Princeton, argues that the shale gas development process needs way more oversight and research.

In a press release, they explain that their "key findings are cause for significant concern and decisive mitigation measures." Findings include the identification of only five of 24 states in the US involved with shale gas development that bother to make their chemical spills and accidents list public. The remaining 19 are thus far just cool with anonymous hazmat events. The paper also found that companies were not disclosing a full list of chemicals being used during the shale gas extraction process either.

In order to extract shale gas out of the earth, companies do something called hydraulic fracturing, where they basically inject rocks with a high-pressure blend of water, sand, and various chemicals in order to break the rock up and release the shale gas, with the resulting waste material possibly including carcinogens and radioactive substances. Drilling firms aren't disclosing the exact chemicals they are using to break up the rock though, which the authors of the current paper find especially irksome. The spills, either from accidents, equipment failure like leaks in faulty basins, or downright "illegal activity" are not public knowledge either. The authors of the study called this lack of transparency "particularly worrisome."

Besides injecting Earth's soil with harmful materials either deliberately or by accident and not bothering to telling anyone about it, the process of dividing up the landscape with roads, wells, and other mining formations affects flora and fauna beyond the "air, water, noise and light pollution." The shale gas development process is geographically isolating, creating mini-islands of plants and animals that are not sustainable.

One of the co-authors of the study, Viorel Popescu from Simon Frasier University, explained it like so:

"Think about the landscape and its habitats as a canvas. At first, the few well pads, roads and pipelines from shale development seem like tiny holes and cuts, and the canvas still holds. But if you look at a heavily developed landscape down the road, you see more holes and cuts than natural habitats. Forests or grasslands that were once continuous are now islands fragmented by a dense web of roads, pipelines and well pads. At what point does the canvas fall apart? And what are the ecological implications for wide-ranging, sensitive species such as caribou or grizzly bears?"

A herd of caribou can travel across 800 miles every year in search of food. A grizzly bear's territory is between 1,000 and 1,500 square miles. Break those miles up with roads and wells and other shale gas infrastructure, and you disrupt (and ultimately kill) those roaming species.

The study, which Motherboard received a preview copy of, went as far as to describe shale development as "the most severe threat to plants and animals" and noted shale basins, especially those located in eastern American states, are built in areas of "exceptional biological diversity." Are you comfortable with the term "defaunation" yet?

Shale basins also are built around freshwater sources so these companies aren't just secretly poisoning fish and amphibians.

"We can't let shale development outpace our understanding of its environmental impacts," said co-author of the study Morgan Tingley, of Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, in a statement. The study also calls this outpacing a "knowledge gap," induced largely by a lack of corporate transparency.

Shale gas production has taken off since 2007, with production of this natural gas up 700 percent in the United States. By 2012, shale gas had become so popular, Forbes called it a "craze" and noted that China wanted in on it. To keep up with demand, Canada is proposing 16 new plants that would require hundreds of miles of pipeline and roads, a development researchers specifically called out in their report as a particular concern.