I’m flattered that Energy in Depth finds me enough of a threat to write about me twice in such a short time span. There was the Sunday Comics edition and now they have written about fracking earthquakes. My statcounter says no one is paying much attention to them.
The interesting thing is they seem to be in lockstep with JunkScience which is a project of the Cato Institute.
JunkScience.com is a website maintained by Steven J. Milloy, an adjunct scholar the Cato Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute- right wing think tanks with long histories of denying environmental problems at the behest of the corporations which fund them. Milloy is also a columnist for FoxNews.com. Source Watch.
Read down to the part about Milloy’s involvement in providing cover Junk for Big Tobacco. Then read about Energy In Depth. Anything look familiar? It is important to know that IED and Junk are funded by huge corporations that put corporate profits ahead of everything including public health and safety.
I think IED and Junk might be trying to get their rhetoric out ahead of a new study on drilling and earthquakes. This came out on Energy Wire today but it requires a subscription:
EARTHQUAKES: Drilling activity played a role, but more study needed — Interior’s Hayes (Thursday, April 12, 2012)
There has been a big jump in the number of earthquakes since fracking for shale oil and gas started. They are blaming the quakes on disposal of the waste and not the actual fracking but, Dear Readers, I’m sure you remember this: Seismicity in the Oil Field by Schlumberger. Additional information on fracking earthquakes in FAQ.
BTW, Arkansas had several small quakes this morning. And I just got notification of a 3.1M in Oklahoma.
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OK, there is plenty of raw data available at the state agencies regarding well histories and lengthy records of seismic activity across N. America from the USGS. So, get a reputable university to do a detailed research project and study the actual data. Then, put it out for peer scientific review. Let’s get the complete FACTS and then draw reasonable scientific conclusions before everybody spirals off out of control. That sound too RATIONAL for anybody? Unfortunately, that (probably) makes too much sense…