Nausea Alert: Gasland Part II Is Here

Josh Fox has finally unleashed Gasland Part II upon us.  I’m already getting nauseous, and it’s not from the toxic fumes allegedly derived from natural gas exploration. It’s from this left-wing blowhard. Fox was famously targeted for peddling misinformation in his first film Gasland back in 2010.   Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer released a documentary of their own called FrackNation this year, which addressed the misconceptions Fox illustrated in his film.  One of the points sensationalized in Fox’s documentary is that fracking – and natural gas exploration – causes water to become polluted and flammable.

Dimock, PA has been ground zero for the anti-fracking zealots, who were probably upset when the EPA, their alleged allies, said that the water in there was perfectly safe to drink.  Also, reports of flammable water has been around since at least the 17th century.  It’s how Burning Springs got its name.  It’s located near Bristol, NY.  So, is you wish to watch Fox’s movie, let’s review some of the myths disseminated in Gasland.

Myth: “What I didn’t know was that the 2005 energy bill pushed through Congress by Dick Cheney exempts the oil and natural gas industries from the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act…and about a dozen other environmental regulations.” (6:05)
The Facts:

• Colorado regulators issued a detailed refutation of the alleged link between shale drilling and flammable well water portrayed in the flawed documentary, “Gasland.” They noted that naturally occurring biogenic methane, unrelated to drilling, was the cause of flammable well water.
• ProPublica explained, “Drinking water with methane, the largest component of natural gas, isn’t necessarily harmful. The gas itself isn’t toxic — the Environmental Protection Agency doesn’t even regulate it — and it escapes from water quickly, like bubbles in a soda.”
• Methane-borne water is actually a naturally occurring phenomenon with which even Gen. George Washingtonexperimented in 1783 when he ignited New Jersey’s Millstone River.

• Claims of groundwater contamination have been so deeply flawed that even Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson has publicly and categorically refuted them.

• In no case have we made a definitive determination that [hydraulic fracturing] has caused chemicals to enter groundwater (April 2012)
• “I’m not aware of any proven case where [hydraulic fracturing] itself has affected water.” (May 2011)

• Michelle Bamberger, an Ithaca, New York, veterinarian, and Robert Oswald, a professor of molecular medicine at Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine, published an article suggesting a link between hydraulic fracturing and illness in food animals.

• The piece is decidedly unscientific, providing neither data nor independent corroboration to support their assertions.
• Energy In Depth notes that Dr. Ian Rae, a professor at the University of Melbourne in Australia and  Co-chair of the Chemicals Technical Options Committee for the United Nations Environment Programme, called  the paper “an advocacy piece” that suffers from poor referencing, and the authors themselves “cannot be regarded as experts” in the field in which they are commenting.

• Even while states are moving to join those which already require disclosure of substances used in hydraulic fracturing, the industry routinely uses the online database FracFocus.org. Any visitor to the site can find out additives are being used at any well site in the database
• Typically, water and sand account 99.5 percent of the mix. One of the most frequently used substances in the other one-half of one percent is guar gum, a food thickening agent found in everything from ice cream to pudding.

So, to borrow a term from George Will, citing this film – in any discussion – should be considered journalistic malpractice. According to the Blaze, the farmers, who’ve been hurt by Fox and his minions, were banned from the premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival, despite having tickets for the viewing. McAleer was amongst the farmers, and tried to view the film in order to write a review.