by Michelle Tejada, staff reporter
Hydraulic fracturing, also known as, fracking, can be traced back to over 150 years. Fracking is the process of creating oil by drilling into the earth to release gas from rocks. High pressures of sand, water, and chemicals are injected, so that gas can be released from the rocks.
The high pressure forced into the earth is what provokes small earthquakes. This can affect us in the future by extending the size of small earthquakes into a larger magnitude. This also impacts the formation of land which can lead to a domino effect of problems later on.
Hydrofracking negatively affects the environment in many ways. One example is that it can cause earthquakes. Another example is the excess amount of water being taken out in order to run the gas wells.The water that is left behind is contaminated due to the chemicals, and is used as drinking water in local communities.
“I think that there should be a new method because the oil in the ground is very limited and they should really try something new instead of using the same method,” freshman Harrison Yeung said.
The huge amounts of wastewater that is either injected back into the ground or treated, still harms both the earth and people. The treatment of water is not always successful. They are dumped into local rivers and streams.
“There should be another alternative because fracking is not healthy for the earth and it contaminates our water and it’s not only a little bit, but tons,” senior Rosemarie DiGioia said.
Technology that allows this type of process to happen increases the production and distribution rates. However, there are other methods and even other technologies that could be a better substitute for the environment.
“Fracking is proven to be toxic to the ground, yet we still do it because we want to sell natural gas to other countries and store some for ourselves. There are other sources of energy other than natural gas and we underuse solar and things we’re working on in turns of energy. I don’t see why it is done because there are so many alternatives,“ environmental/chemistry teacher Mr.Van Deurs said.
Oil prices has gone down because of this technology. This technology has also boosted the oil industry. They achieve this by the rapid extraction of oil in a short amount of time. Though there are many perks to this process, it does have its defects and should be highly reconsidered.
