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CNNMoney: Fracking blowback spooks energy industry

Posted Mon, 2011/03/21 - 11:03am by RCAP

Original posting of this article

HOUSTON (CNNMoney) -- The oil and gas industry is reeling from attacks on what it considers one of its most important technologies -- fracking.

Protests across New York State have temporarily banned the practice. Unfavorable coverage in the media and a scathing documentary film that was nominated this year for an Oscar also seem to have scared the industry.

The New York Times: Industry boos Oscar nod for ‘Gasland’

Posted Mon, 2011/01/31 - 11:21am by RCAP

By JOHN COLLINS RUDOLF

“Gasland,” a film that turns a harshly critical eye on the perils of natural gas drilling, has earned an Academy Award nomination for best documentary.

The Oscar nod guarantees even wider exposure for the controversial film, which uses images of flames leaping from kitchen faucets and polluted streams to make an argument for the dangers of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a drilling technique where water and chemicals are injected at high pressure deep underground to free up previously inaccessible natural gas deposits.

CBS's "60 Minutes" looks at fracking

Posted Tue, 2010/11/16 - 4:26pm by RCAP

The Nov. 14 episode of CBS's "60 Minutes" included a segment on natural gas drilling in a process called hydraulic fracturing, also sometimes called fracking. The report focused on the discovery of vast amounts of natural gas in the U.S., which could supply all of the nation's energy needs for years to come and the people who have become wealthy after allowing natural gas to be extracted from shale rock on their property. The report focused briefly on the potential harm to the ground water that this process causes.