Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a well stimulation process used to obtain natural resources from underground geological formations. Although used in several different applications, including the extraction of oil and geothermal energy, hydraulic fracturing in natural gas production from shale formations has recently taken center stage. It is estimated that shale gas will comprise over 20% of the total U.S. gas supply by 2020 (Energy Information Administration, 2009). As hydraulic fracturing has expanded, the public, media, and Congress have expressed rising concerns about the practice. Allegations of natural gas entering private water supplies, well explosions, and polluted streams have sparked controversy about fracking.
In response, Congress directed the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in fiscal year 2010 to study hydraulic fracturing and its potential impacts on drinking water. The goal of this study is to determine whether hydraulic fracturing endangers drinking water and, if so, how these risks can be mitigated. The results of the study, expected by the end of 2012, will help inform EPA‟s regulatory response to hydraulic fracturing. However, given the urgency of fracking concerns, some members of both the public and the government have called for EPA to regulate or halt hydraulic fracturing now. Thus, EPA must consider the policy options available to address these concerns.
This report has multiple objectives: to provide background on hydraulic fracturing, to describe
EPA‟s planned study, to discuss policy options for hydraulic fracturing, and to recommend which policy. Hydraulic fracturing has been used since the 1940s in more than one million wells in the U.S.
(American Petroleum Institute [API], 2010). Fracking is a multi-step process. First, production wells are drilled to provide access to the geologic formation that holds the natural