Fracking is the greater threat to our future

Greg Kozera (“Domestic oil and gas industries would cease without fracking,” Aug. 11 Point/Counterpoint) is terribly misleading. Having toured Doddridge County, W.Va., this spring, I know that fracking takes more than a day. The drilling rig I camped below had been there nearly a year, with noise and night lights — and it exploded a few weeks ago, killing two workers.

Heavy trucks ruined roads and regularly overturned, spilling fracking fluid into creeks . Compressor pads, transfer stations and other operations scar the countryside, along with new roads and pipelines. Finished wells vent dangerous volatile organic chemicals.

No well contamination? Dozens, if not hundreds, of lawsuits have been settled by the industry in Pennsylvania and other states with payments — and a gag clause prohibiting home­owners from talking. And no one can promise that toxic, radioactive fracking fluid will not seep into groundwater decades in the future via the very fissures created by fracking.

Furthermore, to imply that without fracking his children will have “a cold, dark future” is the worst kind of fear-mongering. Solar panel costs have plunged 80 percent in the last five years, and offshore wind turbines are being planned along the East Coast. Why incur the enormous risks of fracking when far better options are available?

CHRIS BOLGIANO
ROCKINGHAM COUNTY

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