Principled Perspectives: Hydraulic Fracturing

Showing posts with label Hydraulic Fracturing. Show all posts

Monday, September 11, 2017

Fracking is a Progressive Technology, not a Necessary Evil

The New Jersey Star-Ledger’s editorial page editor, Tom Moran, came to the defense of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Here are some excerpts from Climate change is why environmentalists must reconsider fracking:

The Sierra Club, like most environmental groups, vehemently opposes fracking for natural gas, and building pipelines to send it to market.

But it's time for them to take a fresh look.

But those risks can be managed with vigorous regulation. The Obama administration has found only a few isolated cases of water contamination, and believes the methane leaks are not big enough to outweigh the clear advantages of switching to natural gas. [This op-ed was published in October, 2016.]

Yes, the ultimate challenge is to wean ourselves off fossil fuels entirely. And a hefty carbon tax is the best way to start. But Washington isn't close to doing that.

Even when they do wake up, as they will have to eventually, a carbon tax would not suddenly end our reliance on all fossil fuels. It would take years, probably decades.

We need to bring a fanatic realism to this fight, and that means taking every step we can to reduce carbon emissions now. Including fracking.

I left these comments:

I agree but have two thoughts.

First, while some climate catastrophists such as the Star-Ledger do seem to have human well-being at heart, this cannot be said of hard-core environmentalists. Hard-core environmentalists do not care if reliable replacements for fossil fuels are available. They mean to shut down fossil fuels, no matter the human cost.

Environmental groups like the Sierra Club are not primarily concerned with climate change. If they were, they’d not only support fracking and natgas pipelines for reasons stated here, but in the long term nuclear power, the only currently viable energy technology with the capability to completely replace fossil fuel electricity generation. Instead, they oppose nuclear. Why? Leading environmentalists are at heart not humanists. They are anti-industrial reactionaries. They see energy deprivation as key to halting industrial progress. That’s why the Sierra Club and its ilk are seen opposing reliable energy projects wherever they are proposed in NJ, such as the recently scuttled natural gas plant in Hillsborough. Their standard of value is to minimize human impact on raw nature, not to maximize human well-being.

Second, this article seems to consider fracking to be a necessary evil. I disagree. Fossil fuels are the most economical and reliable energy technology overall, powering rising living standards around the world. And fracking is the most wonderfully progressive energy technology achievement in a long time. Fracking has opened up vast new supplies of life-giving energy. If governments around the world would get out of the way, fracking would generate many additional decades of reliable cheap energy to fuel human progress the world over. Yes, there are negative side effects. From everything I understand, these problems are fixable through technology and rational anti-pollution laws. (One side effect not mentioned is that the fracking process may trigger small earthquakes in some areas. But that’s not due to fracking, but to related efforts to dispose of wastewater deep underground, where the water lubricates faults causing them to slip. New technologies to dispose of the wastewater are already under development. Click here and here.)

The scientists, entrepreneurs, and investors that brought us fracking are humanitarian heroes, in my view.

Thursday, July 21, 2016

Anti-Fossil Fuel Group ‘Food & Water Watch’ Would Restrict Energy Needed to Produce Plentiful Food and Clean Water

A letter appeared in the New Jersey Star-Ledger claiming that Fracking has been greenwashed as climate-friendly:

In a recent editorial, The Star-Ledger called green groups' opposition to fracking a "travesty" [Fracking, a help in the climate fight, deserves respect from greens. See my posts on this editorial here, here, and here.] The real travesty is how fracking has been greenwashed by the industry and the Obama administration as climate-friendly.

Pipelines and oil trains are crisscrossing the region to rush fracked oil and gas to LNG export terminals and refineries, which pose an immediate threat to drinking water, air quality and public health and safety.

We must reduce both carbon dioxide and methane [a byproduct of natural gas] to address climate change. We must stop the oil trains and pipelines. This means we must stop extreme fossil fuel extraction (which includes fracked gas and oil) and move decisively to true, green energy.

This letter was submitted by Jim Walsh, the New Jersey-based Mid-Atlantic Region Director at a group calling itself, interestingly, Food & Water Watch.

I left these comments:

The author of the letter accusing the Star-Ledger, the industry, and the Obama Administration of “greenwashing” fracking identifies himself as “Jim Walsh, the New Jersey-based Mid-Atlantic Region Director at Food & Water Watch.”

But exactly what food and water does this organization watch? Water doesn’t just come out of our taps automatically from nature. Nor does enough food to feed 7 billion people just happen in nature. Walsh apparently wants us to believe that water and food are just there in nature, and fracking destroys it. But, if Food and Water Watch actually had their eyes open, they’d recognize that the opposite is true. Both adequate clean water and plentiful, nutritious food require massive amounts of reliable fossil fuel energy to produce and deliver, and fracking is the most important energy advance contributing to that flow of water and food producing energy in a long time.

Yet climate witch doctors are trying to take away this vital energy, in the quasi-religious hope that someone, somehow will figure out a way to make “true, green energy” replace it. But nowhere on Earth has “green” energy—solar or wind—proven capable of serving as a primary, dependable energy source. Why is India turning massively to fossil fuels to bring clean water to the 40% of its people that don’t yet have it? Because no fossil fuels, no clean water. Why is our air cleaner than where people from unindustrialized, non-fossil fuel-using regions must rely on dirty, open wood-, coal-, and dung-burning indoor fires for cooking and heating? Because of central fossil-fueled power plants, equipped with modern anti-pollution technologies. Why do we live longer, healthier lives than ever before? Why are we safer than ever from climate-related extreme weather dangers? Fossil fuels.

Anti-fossil activists are not interested in making “green” energy capable of replacing the economical, reliable, industrial-scale energy now provided mainly by fossil fuels. Observe that no one proposes to stop “green energy” from competing in the market. Observe that the Greens want to use government force to shut down our life-giving, proven energy in the hope that “true, green energy” will miraculously do what it hasn’t yet been proven capable of doing—provide economical, reliable, industrial-scale energy. What will happen when we “stop extreme fossil fuel extraction (which includes fracked gas and oil)” and our lights go out, our water stops running, our food becomes increasingly scarce, our heat doesn’t work, our hospitals and schools and factories shut down, and our way of life grinds to a halt, because “green” energy isn’t ready?

There certainly is an “immediate threat to drinking water, air quality and public health and safety”—the energy enemies, armed with unsubstantiated climate alarmism and blind faith in green alternatives. Fracking may not be green, by Walsh’s standards. But neither is “green” energy—far from it. And fracking is great for human life. As long as Walsh, pop-up activist groups like “Food and Water Watch,” and their ilk maintain their war on fossil fuels and other reliable energy sources like nuclear and hydro, the one motive they have no moral right to claim is concern for human well-being.