Environment & Energy

OKIsItJustMe

(19,938 posts) Mon Mar 19, 2012, 09:53 AM Mar 2012

Study shows air emissions near fracking sites may impact health

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-03/uocd-ssa031612.php

[font face=Times,Times New Roman,Serif]Public release date: 19-Mar-2012

Contact: David Kelly
david.kelly@ucdenver.edu
303-315-6374
University of Colorado Denver

[font size=5]Study shows air emissions near fracking sites may impact health[/font]

[font size=4]They contain hydrocarbons including benzene[/font]

[font size=3]AURORA, Colo. -- In a new study, researchers from the Colorado School of Public Health have shown that air pollution caused by hydraulic fracturing or fracking may contribute to acute and chronic health problems for those living near natural gas drilling sites.

"Our data show that it is important to include air pollution in the national dialogue on natural gas development that has focused largely on water exposures to hydraulic fracturing," said Lisa McKenzie, Ph.D., MPH, lead author of the study and research associate at the Colorado School of Public Health.

The study will be published in an upcoming edition of Science of the Total Environment.

The report, based on three years of monitoring, found a number of potentially toxic petroleum hydrocarbons in the air near the wells including benzene, ethylbenzene, toluene and xylene. Benzene has been identified by the Environmental Protection Agency as a known carcinogen. Other chemicals included heptane, octane and diethylbenzene but information on their toxicity is limited.

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Study shows air emissions near fracking sites may impact health (Original Post) OKIsItJustMe Mar 2012 OP

But not the water. There's nothing in there, it's all harmless, and you were already sick. saras Mar 2012 #1

Living on Earth: Is Fracking Making People Sick? OKIsItJustMe Mar 2012 #2

saras

(6,670 posts)

1. But not the water. There's nothing in there, it's all harmless, and you were already sick.

Reply to OKIsItJustMe (Original post)

Mon Mar 19, 2012, 11:50 AM

Mar 2012

OKIsItJustMe

(19,938 posts)

2. Living on Earth: Is Fracking Making People Sick?

Reply to OKIsItJustMe (Original post)

Wed Mar 28, 2012, 05:45 PM

Mar 2012

http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=12-P13-00012&segmentID=3

[font face=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][font size=5]Is Fracking Making People Sick?[/font]

[font size=4]Air Date: Week of March 23, 2012

stream/download this segment as an MP3 file[/font]

[font size=3]Some Pennsylvania residents who live near Marcellus Shale gas wells believe natural gas drilling is contaminating their water and making them sick. But others point to the economic benefits of fracking and say there’s little scientific evidence that exposure to drilling activities causes illness. Reid Frazier of The Allegheny Front reports.

[font size=4]Transcript[/font]

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FRAZIER: Cosmetic procedures like this patient’s are Paré’s specialty. So it’s remarkable that she finds herself in the middle of a public health debate. It started about two years ago.   PARE: We started to have more patients that would have open areas or recalcitrant lesions, that bled, ulcerated, didn’t quite heal. And usually they’re on your face.

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FRAZIER: It turned out many of these patients had one thing in common, they all lived near Marcellus shale gas wells. Paré’s practice is in Washington County, south of Pittsburgh, where over 500 wells have been drilled so far. Paré asked her patients to take a urine test.   

PARE: Unfortunately we did find quite a few people that did have urine that had methane in it, toluene, hippuric acid

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