‘Wél schade aan drinkwater door schaliegasboringen’

8 juni 2015 – Op grond van precies dezelfde studie van het Amerikaanse Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) concludeert een Amerikaanse actiegroep dat er wel degelijk risico’s voor het drinkwater zijn bij het boren naar schaliegas en -olie.

‘DESMOG’ een actiegroep voor ‘clearing the PR pollution that clouds climate science’ bestrijdt de conclusies die  het EPA trekt (zie FluxEnergie, 6 juni jl) uit een eigen onderzoek. EPA concludeerde dat, afgezien van enkele kleinere incidenten, dat het boren naar schaliegas en –olie niet schadelijk is voor het drinkwater in de bodem.
DESMOG citeert voor de tegengestelde conclusie ook uit het EPA-rapport.
DESMOG:
(…)“From our assessment, we conclude there are above and below ground mechanisms by which hydraulic fracturing activities have the potential to impact drinking water resources,” the EPA wrote.
The impacts take a variety of forms, the EPA wrote, listing the effects of water consumption especially in arid regions or during droughts, chemical and wastewater spills, “fracturing directly into underground drinking water resources,” the movement of liquids and gasses below ground “and inadequate treatment and discharge of wastewater.”
The agency wrote that it had documented “specific instances” where each of those problems had in fact happened and some cases where multiple problems combined to pollute water supplies.
Environmental groups welcomed the agency’s central conclusion as vindication.
Today EPA confirmed what communities living with fracking have known for years,” said Earthworks policy director Lauren Pagel. “Fracking pollutes drinking water.”
But they also cautioned that the EPA’s assessment seemed likely to understate the risks associated with fracking, in part because it relied heavily on data that was self-reported by the drilling industry.
So, just how badly has the process contaminated America’s water already, and how big are the risks from more fracking? The EPA can’t say, the draft report concluded.
“We did not find evidence that these mechanisms have led to widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water resources in the United States,” the EPA wrote.
But that’s not necessarily because the impacts are in fact rare, the EPA added, but because of the difficulties involved in definitively proving contamination occurred in every case.
“This finding could reflect a rarity of effects on drinking water resources, but may also be due to other limiting factors. These factors include: insufficient pre- and post-fracturing data on the quality of drinking water resources; the paucity of long-term systematic studies; the presence of other sources of contamination precluding a definitive link between hydraulic fracturing activities and an impact; and the inaccessibility of some information on hydraulic fracturing activities and potential impacts,” the agency wrote. (…)
DESMOG concludeert: ‘Fracking Supporters Try to Spin Study To Their Advantage’.

Bronnen
DESMOG, 4 juni 2015: EPA Study: Fracking Puts Drinking Water Supplies at Risk of Contamination
FluxEnergie, 6 juni 2015: Onderzoek: ‘Geen schade aan drinkwater door boren naar schaliegas’
EPA-rapport, 4 juni 2015: ‘Assessment of the Potential Impacts of Hydraulic Fracturing for Oil and Gas on Drinking Water Resources’
EPA-website, 4 juni 2015: EPA’s Study of Hydraulic Fracturing for Oil and Gas and Its Potential Impact on Drinking Water Resources
Het Financieele Dagblad, 5 juni 2015: ‘Boren naar schaliegas is veilig’ (registratie)

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Auteur: Redactie

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