Did the EPA Just Unofficially Endorse Frackers?

On Thursday, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its draft assessment related to the potential impacts of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) activities on drinking water resources in the United States. The conclusion: it depends.

The EPA found no evidence of widespread, systemic impacts on the country’s drinking water. However, the agency did find specific cases where drinking water was affected or even contaminated. An EPA official said:

Hydraulic fracturing activities in the U.S. are carried out in a way that have not led to widespread, systematic impact on drinking water resources. In fact, the number of documented impacts to drinking water is relatively low when compared to the number of fractured wells.

The report is being received warmly by the oil and gas industry. An American Petroleum Industry (API) official said:

After more than five years and millions of dollars, the evidence gathered by EPA confirms what the agency has already acknowledged and what the oil and gas industry has known. Hydraulic fracturing is being done safely under the strong environmental stewardship of state regulators and industry best practices. … Hydraulic fracturing has been used safely in over a million wells, resulting in America’s rise as a global energy superpower, growth in energy investments, wages, and new jobs.

Among environmental groups, the response is more muted, to say the least. EcoWatch noted that the new EPA study “refuted the conclusion” of a 2004 EPA study that found fracking posed “no threat to drinking water, a conclusion used to exempt the fracking process from the Safe Drinking Water Act.” Readers with long (and good) memory banks will recall that this was known as the “Halliburton loophole,” a reference to then-vice president (and former Halliburton CEO) Dick Cheney’s role in getting frackers the exemption.

The EPA draft released Thursday also noted that there is not a lot of data either pre- or post-fracking related to the quality drinking water resources. It does not take a lot of imagination to figure out what the solution to that problem is, but it also doesn’t take a lot of imagination to figure out that there are costs involved, and no one wants to pay those costs.

The new study does not aim to be a prescriptive document. Its investigation was limited to certain mechanisms that may lead to negative effects on drinking water, but it offers no generalized conclusion other than “it depends.”