The case for fracking

Fracking, as just about everybody knows by now, is short for hydraulic fracturing, a system of extracting oil that involves a high pressure mix of water, sand and hazardous chemicals. There is mounting evidence that fracking poses risks to water supplies. However, there is also mounting evidence that fracking could increase our country’s output of oil by 25 percent within the next 10 years.

According to this story in today’s New York Times, one of the most bountiful such oil fields is Eagle Ford in South Texas where more than a dozen companies are erecting 3,000 wells.

“The oil industry says any environmental concerns are far outweighed by the economic benefits of pumping previously inaccessible oil from fields that could collectively hold two or three times as much oil as Prudhoe Bay, the Alaskan field that was the last great onshore discovery,” the Times story says. “The companies estimate that the boom will create more than two million new jobs, directly or indirectly, and bring tens of billions of dollars to the states where the fields are located, which include traditional oil sites like Texas and Oklahoma, industrial stalwarts like Ohio and Michigan and even farm states like Kansas.”

Real estate values have reportedly doubled in the Eagle Ford area, which is already producing 100,000 barrels a day and could reach 420,000 by 2015. That’s the same amount of oil produced by the entire country of Ecuador.

I’m thinking that with all this mother lode of riches all over the place, there’s no need to try to find more inside the city limits of Dallas. An effort to protect our ground water won’t put a huge dent in this oil glut.