This is a replica of Murdoch’s model. A top-secret design for a vehicle that could pull carriages along the road ... Murdoch continued developing his model vehicle throughout the 1780s ... He was fascinated by high-pressure steam. Mark Williams: Industrial Revelations s2e3: Gas on Wheels, Discovery 2005
This time extracting gas from coal ... He soon became so successful that he lit his own house. The first house lit by gas in the world. And Murdoch’s employers soon turned gas-light into big business. From 1805 mills and factories were to work shifts around the clock using their own gas generating plants. It wasn’t long before everyone wanted the new light. ibid.
One of the most extraordinary pieces of machinery in the entire industrial age in my opinion – this is a Scrubber. The idea in our computer-dominated nano-technology world that the way to remove ammonia from gas is to scrub it with brushes underwater seems fantastic. But that’s what the machine does: gas is bubbled through water and scrubbed by slowly revolving brushes, and this is how town gas was cleaned throughout the whole of its life as a fuel supply. ibid.
200 years later Murdoch’s coal gas was readily available. It could be fed into an engine and ignited again and again and again. ibid.
I’m not a pessimist. I’ve always had a great deal of faith in people that we wouldn’t succumb to frenzy or rage or greed. That we’d figure out a solution without destroying the things that we love. Josh Fox, Gasland ***** 2010
‘Hydraulic fracturing has been characterised as environmentally risky and inadequately regulated. Press reports and websites alleging that six states have documented over 1,000 incidents of groundwater contamination resulting from the practice of hydraulic fracturing – such reports are not accurate.’ ibid. evidence to sub-committee on Energy & Minerals
In 1972 Richard Nixon signed the Clean Water Act into law. ibid.
One day I got a letter in the mail; it was from a natural gas company. The letter told me my land was on top of a formation called the Marcellus Shale which stretched across Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio and West Virginia. And that the Marcellus Shale was the Saudi Arabia of natural gas. I could lease my land to this company and I would receive a signing bonus of $4,750 an acre. Having 19.5 acres that was nearly $100,000 there in my hand. ibid.
The 2005 Energy Bill pushed through Congress by Dick Cheney exempts the oil and natural gas industries from the Safe Drinking Water Act. They were also exempt from the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Superfund Law and about a dozen other environmental and democratic legislations. ibid.
The method of gas drilling they used is called hydraulic fracturing ... Like a mini-earthquake ... A mix of over 596 chemicals. ibid.
Shortly after their well was drilled their water started bubbling and fizzing – it turned out to be natural gas. ibid.
I’d heard reports of oil and gas waste-water known as produced water, the water that comes back up out of the ground that’s contaminated with the fracting fluids being dumped illegally on to fields and into streams, and I’d heard of workers who had chemical burns on their hands and faces. ibid.
I was starting to compile a list of things that could happen in Dimmock: water trouble, health problems, hazardous explosive conditions inside the house, destruction of land ... A total loss of normal life. ibid.
There was no-one for them to complain to. ibid.
[lights drinking water from tap] Jesus Christ! ibid.
The Whistleblower: Weston Wilson – In 2004 the EPA was investigating water contamination incidents due to hydraulic fracturing across the country, but a panel rejected the Inquiry stating that although hazardous materials were being injected underground the EPA did not need to investigate. Weston Wilson, a twenty-year veteran of the EPA, wrote a letter to Congress objecting. ibid.
Energy Police Act of 2005: The Halliburton Loophole to the Safe Water Act. ibid.
Glycol Ethers eat the membrane inside the filters. ibid.
Of all the [chemical] water that goes down only about half of it comes back up. ibid.
Evaporation Sprayers ... In flow-back pits the water is sprayed into the air ... They create ozone hazardous air pollutants and they fall down in the form of chemical or acid rains on the grasslands. ibid.
Theo [Dr Colborn] has identified 596 different chemicals in 900 chemical products. ibid.
I tried to keep anger and sorrow at bay. ibid.
I wanted to get out of Gasland as fast as I could. But there was nowhere to go ... Everywhere I went it was the same story. ibid.
I’d seen these condensation tanks everywhere all across the United States. ibid.
Industry has leased hundreds of thousands of acres within the New York City watershed and the Delaware basin. ibid.
There were hours and hours of hearings at city hall. But no-one from the State’s department of environmental conservation came to the city’s hearings. ibid.
It’s possible the Gasland might stretch a little bit further from my backyard into yours. ibid.
‘We have a supply of natural gas that can last America nearly 100 years.’ Josh Fox, Gasland II ***** 2013, Obama
‘The United States will promote the use of shale gas.’ ibid. Hillary Clinton
Gulf of Mexico, July 4 2010: 75th day of the BP oil spill: It was hard to believe my eyes: as far as I could see the surface of the Gulf was streaked with oil like ghosts along the surface. ibid. Fox
BP was spraying chemical dispersants on the surface of the Gulf in huge volumes, a chemical that had been banned in Britain actually makes the oil more toxic and sinks it out of sight: they weren’t solving the crisis, just hiding it. ibid.
The F word is not in the dark any more … with one to two million new wells projected … creating an industrial redefinition of the landscape. ibid.
The industry doesn’t have to tell the public what chemicals they’re using. ibid.
Thousands of wells drilled, thousands of reported violations: The New York Times investigated and found that waste-water from drilling was being inadequately treated and dumped back into water supplies all over Pennsylvania. ibid.
And here the gas industry was employing former psy-ops experts to actually write local laws and develop techniques. ibid.
The Pennsylvania department of Homeland Security lists anti-fracking protest groups as possible terrorists. ibid.
Schlumberger: Over a 30 year period over 50% of wells failed. ibid.
The problem is that everywhere the gas drilling industry goes, a trail of water contamination, air pollution, health concerns and betrayal of basic American civic and community values follows. Josh Fox
Hydraulic fracturing requires massive amounts of water. Disposing of the toxic waste-water, as well as accidental spills, can contaminate drinking water and harm human health. David Suzuki
Too often, governments are quick to use excessive force and even pervert the course of justice to keep oil and gas flowing, forests logged, wild rivers dammed and minerals extracted. As the Global Witness study reveals, citizens are often killed, too – especially if they’re poor and indigenous. David Suzuki
In the US where fracking is well established there’s growing alarm amid stories of gas-contaminated drinking water. Tonight: The Truth about Fracking, ITV 2013
A rush for energy in America – for a type of gas that appears cheap and plentiful. One with just one way of getting it out of the ground – hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Horizon: Fracking – The New Energy Rush, BBC 2013
For some the great hope of the future – shale gas. It doesn’t come out easily. ibid.
You need to pump water under very high pressure deep underground – that fractures the bedrock. ibid.
The pipes, the lorries, the rigs, blights rural communities. ibid.
Fracking is starting to change the politics and economics of this nation. ibid.
Some guy is going to be cooking his hamburger one day and blow up the town. Mayor of Dish
Emissions from these sectors are greater than the accumulated emissions of all passenger vehicles. Dr Al Armendariz, air quality specialist & researcher, Southern Methodist University
All is gas and gaiters. Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby
Gas looming through the fog in divers places in the streets, much as the sun may, from the spongy fields, be seen to loom by husbandman and ploughboy. Most of the shops lighted two hours before their time – as the gas seems to know, for it has a haggard and unwilling look. Charles Dickens, Bleak House
Burning carbon-based substances like oil, gas, and especially coal, produces billions of tons of extra carbon dioxide each year. Methane gas from cows and pigs and other animals on our large farms ends up in the atmosphere as well, trapping more of the sun's energy as heat. Bill Nye
Natural gas is hemispheric. I like to call it hemispheric in nature because it is a product that we can find in our neighborhoods. George W Bush