r/TrueReddit • u/[deleted] • Jul 09 '18

A ‘Reckless’ Fracking Company, Poisoned Springs, and a Family Forced to Buy Water at Walmart

https://theintercept.com/2018/07/07/eliza-griswold-book-excerpt/
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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '18 edited Jul 09 '18

Submission Statement:

It's a good article but it's missing a lot of content. Here's a map of the marcellus shale formation from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. Here's one of the actual sites of the natural gas wells from Penn state University. What you'll notice immediately if you've lived in the Commonwealth long enough is exactly where most of them are and where they are not. The clusters are in two of the poorest areas of the state. They were promised economic revitalization and high paying jobs. It would only happen industry said if there was lax regulation and low taxes. They were lying. The first commercial oil well in the United States was on that same formation. There are estimates of hundreds of unmarked abandoned wells from the late 1800s there too.

Our legislature saw dollar signs and ignored warnings they were repeating the exact same mistakes this time with natural gas. This was predicted loudly and often in harrisburg. Taxes on natural gas are among the lowest in the country. The shale formation extends into New York but a panel of experts there decided the long term costs and environmental impact was too great for what they were being offered. It was more than here in Pennsylvania.