The Arithmetic of Shale Gas

[irishbobcat]

And I am sure the land-man and the fracking companies tell home owners up front in big BOLD letters and in loud and clear terms that they should pay for baseline quality measurements up front before signing a fracking agreement. I am sure the fracking companies tell
homeowners that such tests can cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars up front.....

What? They don't? oh I get it......I guess the fracking companies live by the slogan "buyer beware"....

[Rick Rowlands]

Like in any court case, there is a burden of proof to be met.  You have to have baseline water quality measurements so the court can determine that contamination was caused by drilling operations. 

[irishbobcat]

The problem Ricky is that the fracking folks refuse to pay for clean-up....citizens have to drag them to court and pray that the judge hasn't been bought off by fracking donations.....heck, fracking companies have damaged water wells and won't even buy the homeowners bottled water.  The true arithmetic is damn the environment....just let me make a buck....

[Rick Rowlands]

This is an interesting article. A group of Yale economics graduates did a cost benefit analysis of shale gas, and even after including the damage of a hypothetical 100 wells being polluted per year by fracking, the overall benefit of using shale gas is between 200 to 400 to 1 over not using it.   This proves that the risks are truly worth the reward.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2012/06/22/the-arithmetic-of-shale-gas/