Hydraulic Fracturing & Drinking Water

EPA Science Advisory Board Report: under SOME circumstances, hydraulic fracturing activities can impact drinking water resources. However, data gaps & uncertainties limit EPA’s ability to fully assess the potential impacts on drinking water resources locally and nationally.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (99): report advances scientific understanding of hydraulic fracturing’s impact on drinking water resources; seeks to inform decisions by federal, state, tribal, and local officials; industry; seeks to help communities protect drinking water resources now and in the future.

EPA Report (99): Data gaps and uncertainties limited EPA’s ability to fully assess the potential impacts on drinking water resources locally and nationally. Because of these data gaps and uncertainties, it was not possible to fully characterize the severity of impacts, nor was it possible to calculate or estimate the national frequency of impacts on drinking water resources from activities in the hydraulic fracturing water cycle.

EPA Scientific Evidence (99): hydraulic fracturing activities can impact drinking water resources under some circumstances. The report identifies certain conditions under which impacts from hydraulic fracturing activities can be more frequent or severe:

• Water withdrawals for hydraulic fracturing in times or areas of low water availability, particularly in areas with limited or declining groundwater resources;
• Spills during the handling of hydraulic fracturing fluids and chemicals or produced water that result in large volumes or high concentrations of chemicals reaching groundwater resources;
• Injection of hydraulic fracturing fluids into wells with inadequate mechanical integrity, allowing gases or liquids to move to groundwater resources;
• Injection of hydraulic fracturing fluids directly into groundwater resources;
• Discharge of inadequately treated hydraulic fracturing wastewater to surface water; and
• Disposal or storage of hydraulic fracturing wastewater in unlined pits resulting in contamination of groundwater resources.

EPA Science Advisory Board (98): established pursuant to the Environmental Research, Development, and Demonstration Authorization Act codified at 42 U.S.C. 4365, to provide independent scientific and technical advice to the Administrator on the technical basis for Agency positions and regulations. The SAB is a Federal Advisory Committee chartered under the Federal Advisory Committee Act, 5 U.S.C., App. 2.

Note 1 (99): U.S. EPA Hydraulic Fracturing for Oil and Gas: Impacts from the Hydraulic Fracturing Water Cycle on Drinking Water Resources in the United States (Final Report). U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, EPA/600/R-16/236F, 2016.

Note 2 (98): EPA Science Advisory Board (SAB). The Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency shall establish a Science Advisory Board which shall provide such scientific advice as may be requested by the Administrator, the Committee on Environment and Public Works of the United States Senate, or the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, on Energy and Commerce, or on Public Works and Transportation of the House of Representatives.

(99) EPA Study of Hydraulic Fracturing & Drinking Water: https://cfpub.epa.gov/ncea/hfstudy/recordisplay.cfm?deid=332990

(98) EPA Science Advisory Board: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2015/06/05/2015-13674/notification-of-teleconferences-and-a-public-meeting-of-the-science-advisory-board-hydraulic AND https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/USCODE-2017-title42/html/USCODE-2017-title42-chap55-subchapIII-sec4365.htm