Another reason to be leery of fracking.

[grntuscarora]

Not that I needed one.


Fracking at Marcellus Shale Site: Hydraulic Fracturing Increases Radionuclides
Author: Judy Haar : Posted to Decoded Science on December 4, 2011 at 12:23 pm

http://www.decodedscience.com/fracking-at-marcellus-shale-site-hydraulic-fracturing-increases-radionuclides/7044

"Hydraulic fracturing has a strong potential of concentrating the already existing radionuclides, making them accessible to human contact either through disposal or handling. In the 1980s, at other gas drill sites, higher concentrations of radioactivity presented concerns about site workers and the general public when dealing with disposal and by-products from the process."

snip

"Radium is soluble in water, and is carried easily by the large volumes of water that are used as part of the hydro-fracking process. A build-up in pipes and on equipment could increase radiation levels, and pose a risk to the workers. Filters in the treatment facilities can also concentrate the radioactive material. Studies performed on the Marcellus shale through core samples and analysis of the process show that the amount of radioactivity is 20 times higher than background and would be concentrated through the process."

[txlibdem]

1. Concentrated radiatioactive material from Natural Gas

The anti-nukers (who "claim" that they are against radiation) ought to be jumping onto this OP like mad and voicing their outrage -- RADIATION.

Any anti-nukers posting here? Nope? Very curious, eh?

[Nihil]

3. Yeah, you got it ...

> The anti-nukers (who "claim" that they are against radiation) ought to be
> jumping onto this OP like mad and voicing their outrage -- RADIATION.

The snag is that the most vocal one of the above doesn't like to post anything
that is detrimental to his beloved "natural gas", prefering to push solutions
that require said gas whilst laying down a smoke-screen of howls & smears
against anyone who *dares* to question his repeated (oh so repeated!) pronouncements
of his opinion.

Maybe one of the other more reasonable anti-nukers will chime in but, going from
today's catch-up of the weekend's posts, I think that even they are more interested
in parroting the "Squawk, nuclear bad!" line at the moment than accepting the genuine
everyday dangers being presented by stuff like the OP.

:shrug:

[txlibdem]

7. True, and oil drilling pipes get coated with radioactive material... then are piled on the ground

Do you hear a roar of outrage from the anti-nuke crowd about that? Nope.

This is so confusing to me. They say that the RADIATION from nuclear power is the BAD thing... yet natural gas, coal and oil all release RADIOACTIVE material all day long and they don't say a peep!

I'm beginning to wonder if the anti-nuke crowd is being honest...

[doc03]

2. Gee Chesapeake Energy has been flooding the air waves

and newspapers around here lately telling us how safe fracking is. According to them there has never been one case of fracking affecting the water table, it can't happen they encase the well in multiple layers of concrete and steel. One thing they don't tell us is there is one guarantee with concrete it will crack and steel will rust. Oh and the fracking fluid is like 99.5% just plain old water. They don't tell us they pump 7 million gallons of fluid into the ground and that .5% is 35000 gallons of who knows what. We have had people that had their wells catch fire and they blame it on old coal mines.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

4. k and r

Ban fracking.

Damn lying ads.

[Bob Wallace]

5. Am I anti-nuke?

I realize that nuclear is too expensive, takes too long to construct, and brings safety issues unlike any other form of electricity generation.

I would accept building lots of reactors except for the fact that we have cheaper, faster to implement and safer alternatives.

Does that make me an anti-nuke or a nukes-fail-the-three-important-tests?

Fracking. It comes with a number of problems which we need to solve quickly or quit fracking. And we need to get past natural gas or any other type of extracted carbon which we turn into CO2.

It seems to me that we need to significantly curtail fracking until we've got a better hand on the problems. But I don't think that will happen, too many people are making too much money. Our most reasonable hope would seem to be in continued price drops for wind and solar so that NG plants are used less.

[txlibdem]

6. What you say is true of the LWR and BWR nuclear plants, not true of Gen 4 or SMR's

The anti-nukers are basically fighting against 1960s and 1970s technology with all of their arguments against nuclear power. And we pro-nuclear power citizens are in full agreement with them: we should never again build a 1960s-era nuclear plant. But we should allow the newest generation of nuclear power to move forward because they are designed to be inherently safe. The laws of physics govern their operation and a meltdown is impossible... unless someone changes the laws governing the Universe (unlikely by the way). And that is what frightens the anti-nukers most: a successful and safe nuclear power plant.

But you bring up a good point. With all the dangers inherent in fracking, why aren't the anti-nuke crowd jamming this OP like mad, demanding investigations into the radiation. After all, that's why they say they're so terrified of nuclear power... isn't it? I just like to point out the inconsistency of their radiation fears wherever I see it... it's instructive to find the honest citizens among the single-minded zealots.

I never trust a zealot. They will say or do anything to "win" for their particular side and neither morals nor codes of conduct seem to guide their behavior.

[Bob Wallace]

8. Only problem with that is...

There are no Gen 4 or SMR plants. We don't know how much they would cost to build. Nor how long they would take to build. There's no reason to think that a thorium reactor using molten salt transfer would be significantly faster or cheaper to build. And during the 20 years or so for us to find out the price of wind and solar will continue to fall.

Small modular reactors are likely built on false hope. One does not achieve economies of scale with 100 units. It takes tens of thousands sort of activity to drastically reduce costs. (Hyperion recently doubled their cost estimate.)

The nuclear industry has repeatedly promised low and delivered high.

Plus SMRs have an enormous NIMBY problem. Just try to find 100 US communitites willing to permit a reactor of any size in their neighborhood.

Gen 4 thorium might be safer, but it still fails two of the three important tests.

Seems to me that the pro-nukers would like us to forget the history of the nuclear industry. We didn't stop building reactors in the US because of TMI. The US nuclear industry was already grinding to a halt prior to that meltdown. Cost of reactors killed nuclear builds. Construction costs are significantly higher now. And we've developed multiple cheaper/faster/safer methods of generating electricity.

Just call me a nuclear-realist. Nuclear is a problem-bedridden solution for a problem for which we have better solutions.

[txlibdem]

10. 6 companies are in the approval pipeline TODAY to build SMRs

So you say there are none... today... and you are right. But that will change within a decade. What will you argue then???

Your post shows a lack of information about SMR construction and Gen 4 Thorium power plants. You cite construction costs soaring... which is correct of LWR and BWR -- but NOT of SMR power plants.

[Bob Wallace]

12. My crystal ball is broken...

It doesn't tell me the cost to build something that we've never before built.

My hindsight mirror is working and it tells me that when it comes to the nuclear industry many promises were made and many promises were broken. Reactors came in at extremely higher costs than the industry projected.

Now, I'm seeing claims that Gen4 Thorium plants will produce power at 40% less than uranium-fueled plants. OK, let's work with that having no better numbers.

Electricity from a new nuclear plant would likely be $0.20/kWh or higher. Plus subsidies. Let's low-ball it and use 20 cents and ignore the cost to taxpayers.

60% of twenty cents is twelve cents per kWh.

In order for that Gen4 Thorium plant to avoid bankruptcy it has to sell its power 24/7 at $0.12/kWh.

(There's no reason to thing SMRs will be any cheaper. They will still be built one at a time, largely by hand. Their production runs will not be large enough to permit lots of automation and quantity discounts on parts. There would be more reactors per units of output, meaning much higher permitting and location costs.)

Wind is wholesaling around $0.05/kWh. Add in the $0.02/kWh PTC and wind is seven cents. While we didn't make nuclear account for its subsidies we'll put a further helping finger under the nuclear side of the scale and make wind accountable.

When wind is on line (which it is a lot) nuclear looses at least $0.05/kWh. (Realistically a lot more since wind can sell close to zero/kWh and still make a profit.) In order to make up for that loss nuclear has to sell for at least $0.17/kWh.

Solar in the sun belt is already $0.15/kWh and rapidly falling. That eats up another portion of nuclear's break even/make a profit market. Now nuclear is loosing money most of the time just to dump its power into a market with prices set by cheaper renewables. It is competing with gas peakers for the ~10% of the total time that we call on peakers. Nuclear can't compete with gas peakers if it has to shove all of its loses into 10% of the market.

If nuclear has to lose a nickle 90% of all hours then it needs to earn around $0.70/kWh in the remaining 10%.



John Rowe, the COE of Exelon - Exelon is the largest owner of nuclear plants in the US, they own 17 - said the same thing. New nuclear cannot compete.

[txlibdem]

13. 40% reduction is baseless, I reject it out of hand

SMRs and LFTRs will be mass produced.

Did mass production bring a 40% cost reduction to the DVD, the VCR, computer chips? No, it brought the initial costs down to infinitesimal levels compared to where they started.

Where in your logic does mass production of a small nuclear power plant differ?

[Bob Wallace]

15. They will?

Obviously they won't. Stop and think for a moment.

They initially will be built one at a time until the bugs are ironed out. It will take a decade or more to get the first ones up and running and another decade or more to refine.

By the time anyone can figure out how to build cheaper reactors, renewables and storage will almost certainly be cheap and installed in very large amounts. Reactors won't be competitive even if they crank out $0.10/kWh electricity. They will not be able to sell that power 24/7 and at the same time they cannot turn off their loan payments.

You can reject a 40% cost reduction out of hand because it doesn't match your fantasy but until you can generate some objective numbers it's the best we've got to work with. That's a nuclear reactor without a containment dome. It still takes a lot of concrete, steel and labor.

Mass production is not 50 or 100 units. Economies of scale are not hit until much, much higher levels of production. To get to 10,000 units you've got to have a market for the first 100, then the second 100, then....

Without buyers willing to spend very large amounts of money for the first few thousand you don't reach scale. And the individual units will be too expensive to permit the manufacturer to eat the loss on the first tens of thousands.

We had to buy millions and millions of chips and hard drives before their prices reached 'cheap'. I paid the equivalent of $266,667 per gig for my first (30meg) hard drive. I can now buy a gig for about $.09 thanks to billions of hard drive sales.

[txlibdem]

17. Yup, I'm sure Henry Ford thought the same way

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Model_T#Price

Price

The standard 4-seat open tourer of 1909 cost $850<35> (equivalent to $20,709 today), when competing cars often cost $2,000–$3,000 (equivalent to $48,726–$73,089 today); in 1913, the price dropped to $550 (equivalent to $12,181 today), and $440 in 1915 (equivalent to $9,521 today). Sales were 69,762 in 1911; 170,211 in 1912; 202,667 in 1913; 308,162 in 1914; and 501,462 in 1915.<30> In 1914, an assembly line worker could buy a Model T with four months' pay.<30>

By the 1920s, the price had fallen to $290 (equivalent to $3,289 today) because of increasing efficiencies of assembly line technique and volume. Henry employed vertical integration of the industries needed to create his cars.

[Bob Wallace]

19. Did you pay attention...

To the numbers you were writing?

1. Henry's 1909 Model T cost $850 vs. $2,000 to $3,000 for the competitors' cars.

2. Sales in 1911 = 69,782, in 1912 = 202,667, in 1913 = 308,162 and in 1915 = 501,462. Prices fell from $850 to $440 after over half million units were built.

Economy of scale does not happen with a few dozen or a hundred units. And you do not sell dozens, certainly not hundreds, when your competition undercuts your price.

[txlibdem]

21. How exactly would the competition undercut the price?

It seems like you're defending the bloated and generally incompetent nuclear power plant construction industry. Since we are talking about nuclear power plants, not greeting cards or woven baskets.

[Bob Wallace]

24. Read the posts again...

I'm afraid you lost track.

[txlibdem]

25. Wrong. You've lost sight of who is the competition for SMRs and Gen 4 Lithium power plants

You cannot compete with a 24/7/365 (-10%) power source by substituting an intermittent power source. The only competition for SMRs and LFTRs is either a traditional nuclear power plant or renewable energy with excess capacity + energy storage adequate to equal a 90% availability, as is the average for nuclear power in the USA.

Blue sky thinking will not keep a city warm or recharge thousands of electric cars. Add up the costs; plan for the entire year of daily cycles.

[kristopher]

27. Prove it.

txlibdem wrote, "You cannot compete with a 24/7/365 (-10%) power source by substituting an intermittent power source."

Prove it.

[txlibdem]

28. Which one would you like me to start with?

With adequate storage and extra capacity then renewable energy is a match for any power source. Alone, with no storage and no or inadequate extra capacity then all the renewable energy sources *except* hydrothermal power generation will not be able to match the energy output of an SMR or a LFTR.

Kris, you have written a number of times that, on average, a wind farm will have a capacity factor of 33%. That means that 67% of the time it is making zero power. So what can you do? The public will not stand for a blackout 2/3rds of the time. You know that. We both know that. Why be so obstinate?

Expanding on that, the "on average" means that during some months the wind farm will be producing far more power, perhaps more than a given community needs so they sell it and it goes elsewhere -- no banking the energy for later except on paper. On the other hand, during the months when wind is near zero, or the temperatures fall below freezing, the output of the wind farm will be far less than 33% of it's nameplate capacity.

I've showed you the government charts on wind speed during spring, summer, autumn, and winter. They show tremendous variation: negligible wind in most parts of the nation for months at a time.

[Bob Wallace]

30. Oops...

You have mistaken output capacity of 33% to mean that the wind blows only 1/3rd of the time. That is not what it means.

An output capacity of 33% means that over a year the turbine/wind farm averages 33% of its nameplate rating. It's like your car is capable of 120MPH but your average driving speed is 45MPH.

A multi-year study has shown that if you link multiple wind farms over a moderately wide area you can count on power from wind 85% of the time.

http://news.stanford.edu/news/2007/december5/windfarm-120507.html

Take a look at the two graphs on this page which are built from real world data. They show how wind and solar are integrated into grid supply for both summer and winter.

http://www.stanford.edu/~ehart/AWEA_Poster_Hart_final.pdf

Then think a bit further into the future. There's little geothermal, but we're installing a lot more. There's no storage, but we've got more coming. As storage gets cheaper it will start to displace the natural gas in these illustrations.

[txlibdem]

32. Your chart shows natural gas peaking plants still on top

How does this disprove my thesis that we need adequate excess capacity and energy storage (both)? Your charts show a large and continuing reliance on coal and natural gas, the fossil fuel addiction that is killing us and ultimately the planet.

Your 2nd link also makes my point about the danger of averaging:
"Future Work:
**Repeat calculations with wind and insolation point
data to remove smoothing due to averaging
**Expand optimization to account for seasonal load
fluctuations – this may increase the proportion of
renewable power utilized in winter months, but may
also decrease the renewable power used in summer
months"

So, far from disproving my points, your source material (from Stanford University) has PROVEN me right. Averaging data for an entire month doesn't help the citizens when, on July 18th, a storm sweeps across the nation with high enough winds to cause wind generation to be shut down and clouds enough to decrease solar generation to a trickle.

Now envision the same chart but with double the solar and double the wind, each with a 16 hour energy storage system. Storm? What storm?

Your argument that energy storage adds to the cost of solar and wind is correct. But without adequate energy storage we will never achieve a 100% renewable energy society, ending the use of deadly and dangerous fossil fuels.


Fossil Fuels Kill:

... source: http://blog.gettyimages.com/2007/10/23/documenting-a-planet-in-peril/

[Bob Wallace]

34. Very weird...

How did you ever get the idea that I somehow thought we didn't need "adequate" storage?

My statement was that by utilizing more varied inputs and spreading our input net farther we could minimize the amount of storage we would need.

We'll probably also need something like gas peaking plants for deep backup. Hopefully we'll get to the point where we can run them of biogas.

[Bob Wallace]

29. Reality disagrees with you...

Wind is pushing coal plants off line because wind can underbid any other source of electricity.

http://www.climatespectator.com.au/commentary/why-wind-cutting-energy-costs

If you're running a nuclear plant you have an average $/kwh point you have to hit on a 24/7/365, exempting down time for maintenance/refueling. You can't avoid costs by shutting down, your loan keeps charging you interest, you've still got to provide staff and security and you can't quickly shut down and then ramp back up. Starting and stopping a nuclear plant is a multi-day process, not the 10-15 minutes of a gas turbine.

Wind will force you to sell at a loss. And gas peakers (or stored wind) can provide for less than your $0.15/kW + the loss you need to make up.

There are no 24/7/365 100% always-on power sources. Every single generator has some down time. Grid operators call on various generation systems to see that supply matches demand.

Of course we will build excess renewable capacity. We always build excess capacity for when part of the supply unexpected goes down. We've almost always got generation standing idle, except for a few peak-peak afternoons each year when we flirt with brownouts and have to call on some users to shut down.

I don't think you've got a good handle on renewables. Why don't you give this a read?

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=a-path-to-sustainable-energy-by-2030

[txlibdem]

33. Your reality disagrees with THE reality

Where in the world did you pull the $0.15/kWh out of. You are responding to posts regarding mass produced SMRs and LFTRs. How did you calculate that dollar figure???

PS, solar with adequate amounts of excess capacity energy storage IS a 100% always-on energy source. The only question is whether we are going to continue subsidizing fossil fuels to the tune of $72B per year or are we going to be intelligent enough to take away that $72B and use it instead for the massive build-up of renewable energy sources that we both know we need.

Solar and wind do seem to work well in synergy, one can make up for much of the decreases of the other. But you still need to factor in the times when neither is putting out adequate amounts of power... and that requires energy storage (lots of it).

[Bob Wallace]

35. Fifteen cents...

I took the more likely cost of electricity from a new nuclear plant - $0.20/kWh and deeply discounted it in order to be overly fair to the glow-boys.

There are no mass produced SMRs or LFTRs. We don't even know what a single SMR or LFTR would cost. Any cost speculation is simply speculation. It is very unlikely we will ever see mass produced SMRs or LFTRs, mass produced in the sense that some sort of economy of scale would drastically lower cost of construction.

[txlibdem]

36. "Any cost speculation is simply speculation" and yet you took it as fact and based your case on it?

NuScale estimates $.06 to $.08 per kWh.
http://www.neimagazine.com/story.asp?storyCode=2059041

Nuclear Engineering International Magazine takes a wait and see attitude on the cost due to the numerous unknown variables.
http://www.neimagazine.com/story.asp?storyCode=2059041

[Bob Wallace]

38. No.

I based my $0.20/kWh on three turnkey reactor bids made in the last couple of years plus multiple independent studies of new reactor costs.

Then, in order to be overly fair to the pro-nuke folks, I cut that amount by 25% and demonstrated that even at a bargain price nuclear cannot compete in a non-regulated market.

That is exactly what utility executives such as John Rowe, CEO of Exelon has stated.

Now, I don't see a claim of six to eight cents in your NuScale link. And if it exists somewhere it's built on a basis of nothing. What I do see in your link is the argument that small reactors may, in fact, be more expensive per kWh than large reactors....

"There may, however, be some factors that neutralise these advantages and make the costs per kilowatt of small reactors higher than large reactors. First, in contrast to cars or smart phones or similar widgets, the materials cost per kilowatt of a reactor may go up as the size goes down. This is because the surface area per kilowatt of capacity, which dominates materials cost, goes up as reactor size is decreased. Similarly, the cost per kilowatt of secondary containment, as well as independent systems for control, instrumentation, and emergency management, increases as size decreases. Cost per kilowatt also increases if each reactor has dedicated and independent systems for control, instrumentation, and emergency management. For these reasons, the nuclear industry has been building larger and larger reactors in an effort to try to achieve economies of scale and make nuclear power economically competitive."

[txlibdem]

39. Strange

I could'a sworn I got the correct link:
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/nuscale-progresses-with-small-modular-nuclear-reactors/

[Bob Wallace]

41. Eric has his head up his butt on this one...

"It is anticipated that SMRs will cost about the same to construct per kilowatt as large nuclear plants and will produce electricity at the same cost as a conventional nuclear plant (in the 6 to 8 cent/kWh range)."

No one. Absolutely no one projects electricity out of a new nuclear plant at "6 to 8 cent/kWh". Except the people trying to sell their idea to investors.

That price $4,000/kilowatt is an "overnight" price. It does not include financing, siting, permitting, etc. And it is based on large scale production. In order to produce at that sort of level it will take probably hundreds of these reactors to spread R&D costs and to build supply chains.

Before you swallow the idea that hundreds are going to get built, ask yourself where are they going to put them? Do we have dozens, hundreds of communities that are going to allow a reactor in their backyards? Sure, we can find a few cracker-hoods that will buy the industry baloney but you'll run out of even those in a hurry. We might put a few in the Deep South but give us just one more TMI/Chernobyl/Fukushima and even those folks are going to get uneasy about playing host to something that Homer could melt near their best bass hole.

But let's be generous to these folks. Even at 6 to 8 cents they would have to sell that power 24/7/365 to make payments. What do they do when wind is blowing (a significant number of hours per day)and forces them to sell at a loss? Don't they have to raise their prices for the other hours in order to keep Bubba from repossessing?

Now they're up over 10 cents. Solar, large array, seems to have already hit 10 cents. At worst it's 15 cents and falling fast. Solar gets under nuclear before long and eats up more hours.

Can't crank the price up to 20 cents or even 15 cents to stay in business. Utilities will use gas turbines first.

The only place where nuclear has a chance is places where there is no competitive market. Georgia, South Carolina, China, ....

If SMRs can't compete in any of the US except where utilities have a political stranglehold over consumers how much of the country is left for them to sell their gadgets?

With a small market you cannot achieve economies of scale.

[txlibdem]

44. Thanks for sharing you opinion: that's all it is, no facts, no studies, no hard data

Whereas I provided a direct quote from the head of one of the 6 companies who are working their tails off to get into the energy market.

Since these mini-power plants can be tasked either to supply electricity or heat only they will have a very large market. And since they come in a variety of sizes thousands of cities that thought clean, reliable electricity was too expensive for them will realize that SMRs will fit their needs perfectly. Mass produced means cost reductions in the coming years after first commercialization so they will become more and more attractive.

The clean, safe and reliable SMRs will nicely complement solar power and wind power: no need for natural gas fracking and poisoning our children's drinking water; no need for oil and it's toxic hell unleashed nearly every year; no need for coal that lets nuclear radiation fly out its smokestacks all day and all night long (along with dozens of other deadly toxic chemicals that harm fetal development, make fish in our rivers and lakes poisonous, and cause heart attacks and hospitalizations due to asthma).

Zero carbon energy sources are going to push natural gas, oil, and coal fossils back into the ground where they belong.

[txlibdem]

14. PS, you completely failed to answer the argument in my post (n/t)

[Bob Wallace]

16. This was an argument?

"Six companies are in the approval pipeline to build SMRs.

So you say there are none... today... and you are right. But that will change within a decade. What will you argue then???"

No, I said that there are no companies manufacturing SMRs, if I said anything along that line.

That there are six companies claiming interest does not mean that a single company will actually build one. The most likely, Hyperion, is a long way from building a prototype and has already doubled their cost estimate. Absolute best case, we might see a working prototype in a decade.

Realistically, I think there's no market for SMRs at the price it will cost to produce the first ones. The price of renewables is dropping too rapidly.

I can't argue against unsubstantiated claims. All I can do is point out that they are built on wishes and hopes.

[txlibdem]

18. You can't argue against unsubstantiated claims... but you sure can make them

:thumbsdown: Isn't that interesting...

:dunce:

...

:dunce:

[Bob Wallace]

20. Please point out...

The unsubstantiated claims I made and I will try to reference them for you.

I don't read clown hats, you'll have to translate....

[txlibdem]

22. Already stated... please don't be redundant

And those aren't clown hats, they are dunce hats. Very telling that you didn't know the proper term.

[Bob Wallace]

23. If you have...

A point or a question then state it.

[txlibdem]

26. Posts #10 and #18.

[Bob Wallace]

31. You'll have to excuse me...

I have no time for your games.

[kristopher]

9. Your definition of a zealot is anyone that rules out nuclear.

Only two facts are relevant to your determination of zealotry -
Q 1) Does someone accept nuclear?
Yes - not zealot
No - possible zealot proceed to Q2

Q2) Is the person vocal in their rejection of nuclear?
Yes - Zealot
No - Irrelevant

The facts that are brought to the table that determine the need for nuclear are not a consideration for you. You start and end with the absolute determination that the nuclear industry must be preserved and promoted.

[txlibdem]

11. And he STILL gets it wrong... as if he'd never read a single post of mine in the past.

Your post is, as usual, an attempt to smear the opposition. We've heard it all before... and it's *still* boring to read another attack against someone who disagrees with you.

Please do your homework. Read a few of my posts which call for a balanced energy mix ultimately culminating with a 100% RENEWABLE ENERGY mix. Your argument doesn't hold water.

The "facts" used by anti-nuke zealots are from the 1960s and 1970s. Get with the times and stop the double standard where coal gets to pump 5.2 TONS of Uranium (57,000 pounds of U-235 nuclear bomb material) into open pits or out the smokestack --each and every year, year after year--... and NATURAL GAS FRACKING releases RADIONUCLIDES into our water supply with impunity.

PS, that last sentence should give you a clue about why I think some people are zealots.

[wygene]

37. Fracking reality in Wyoming

Not to minimize the discussion of radiation, but here in WY pollution of the aquifers is a more pressing problem. The EPA has declared Pavillion, WY a Superfund Site due to pollution of the aquifers with what appears to be fracking fluids. EPA is about to issue their final report. If that report identifies fracking as the culprit it will be first time in the nation that science has proved what we all suspected.
Whether or not the EPA has the guts to stand up to the energy companies will be revealed.

If you're interested in this, Google 'Pavillion, WY' or search the ProPublica.com site. The EPA final report will have national implications no matter what it says. And no matter what it says, don't drink the water if you come to Wyoming.

[txlibdem]

40. The fat cats get rich, we get poisoned... and then get stuck paying the Dr. bills

[Frack Glop]

42. Connecting the Dots: The Marcellus Natural Gas Play Players – Part 1

http://commonsense2.com/2011/12/naturalgasdrilling/connecting-the-dots-the-marcellus-natural-gas-play-players-part-1/

[Frack Glop]

43. Elephant in the Gas Well

Elephant in the Gas Well - what no one is talking about
https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B9tP1cRHZ8J_MGZmZjAxYTctOTVhMC00NDc3LWExMDQtNjQ3ODkzZDM2NGY3&hl=en_US