Fracking Good News

Official: 4 Ohio fluid-injection wells cannot open in wake of quake

Officials have shut down fluid-injection wells in eastern Ohio in the aftermath of heightened seismic activity in the area.

State leaders have ordered that four fluid-injection wells in eastern Ohio will be “indefinitely” prohibited from opening in the aftermath of heightened seismic activity in the area, an official said.

Ohio Department of Natural Resources Director James Zehringer had announced on Friday that one such well — which injects “fluid deep underground into porous rock formations, such as sandstone or limestone, or into or below the shallow soil layer,” the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency explains — was closed after a series of small earthquakes in and around Youngstown.

Then on Saturday, a magnitude 4.0 earthquake struck that released at least 40 times more energy than any of the previous 10 or more tremors that had rattled the region in 2011.

Andy Ware, deputy director of Ohio’s natural resources department, told CNN on Sunday that Zehringer and Gov. John Kasich subsequently ordered that four nearby injection well projects will not open in the coming weeks, as had previously been planned. They ‘ll be inoperational until a determination is made in an investigation of a possible link between the earthquakes and the fluid-injection wells, he added.

“They will (not open) until we are satisfied that the process can be safely resumed,” said Ware.

Source: CNN Read more

Opinion:

Fracking is a hazard

Damn good news. The fracking method appears to be man’s most dangerous method of oil recovery and has been responsible for many strange phenomena, earthquakes and gas being released from domestic faucets as well as polluting drinking water.