Right: The graphic below is from a US government EPA environmental working group’s report about fracking. The group says the graphic details how fracking can contaminate wells and groundwater.
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Background information
Hydraulic fracturing, also known as 'fracking', is the promotion of fractures in a rock layer, using a pressurised fluid. Some hydraulic fractures form naturally and can create conduits along which gas and petroleum from source rocks may migrate to reservoir rocks.
Induced hydraulic fracturing or hydro-fracking is a technique used to release petroleum, natural gas (including shale gas, tight gas and coal seam gas) or other substances for extraction. This type of fracturing creates fractures from a wellbore drilled into reservoir rock formations.
The first use of hydraulic fracturing was in 1947 but the modern fracking technique that made the extraction of shale gas economical was first used in 1997 in the Barnett Shale in Texas. The energy from the injection of a highly pressurized fracking fluid creates new channels in the rock, which can increase the extraction rates and ultimate recovery of hydrocarbons.
Proponents of fracking point to the economic benefits from vast amounts of formerly inaccessible hydrocarbons the process can extract. Opponents point to potential environmental impacts, including contamination of ground water, risks to air quality, the migration of gases and hydraulic fracturing chemicals to the surface, surface contamination from spills and flowback and the health effects of this contamination. For these reasons hydraulic fracturing has come under scrutiny internationally, with some countries suspending or even banning it.
Fracking in Australia
In recent years, coal-seam gas (CSG) has transformed Australia's energy market and stimulated the country's economy.
In the six years to 2010, production of CSG increased 22 times. Gas from coal seams now supplies about one third of eastern Australia's gas. David Knox, chairman of the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, an industry body, says the CSG bonanza, on top of Indian Ocean gas, means Australia is likely to overtake Qatar as the world's leading LNG exporter by 2020 (it is now fourth).
However, the debate over hydraulic fracturing has intensified since November 2011 following a report that fracking conducted by Cuadrilla Resources (which is 41% owned by Australian drilling company AJ Lucas), was the cause of two earthquakes near the British town of Blackpool in April and May. Environmentalists like the Lock the Gate Alliance are calling for a rigorous regulatory approach to shale gas fracking in Australia.
Hydraulic fracturing has been suspended in New South Wales and now Victoria; however, it is being widely developed in Queensland. A Senate committee recently called for a moratorium on all future coal seam gas fracking in the Great Artesian Basin in Queensland and New South Wales.
In December, 2011, health officials from the United States Environmental Protection Agency warned a Wyoming town that their groundwater contained hydrocarbons from fracking in their wells. Greens senator for Queensland, Larissa Waters, has argued that the Wyoming case should be a wake-up call for Australia.
The Queensland Government has introduced legislation banning the addition of chemicals benzene, ethylbenzene, toluene and xylene in fracking operations.