The Real Cost of Fracking (27 page)

Anthropogenic climate change is real and must be considered in any rational debate on energy use. The use of natural gas as a substitute for other fossil fuels has been promoted as an answer to climate change. This claim is based on one small difference between methane (the major component of natural gas) and other fossil fuels. In methane, each carbon atom bonds with four hydrogen atoms. In every other hydrocarbon fossil fuel, each carbon atom has two or three bonds with hydrogen atoms and the remainder with another carbon atom. Because the energy released for a carbon-hydrogen bond is greater than that for a carbon-carbon bond and each carbon atom produces one molecule of carbon dioxide when burned, methane releases more energy per carbon dioxide molecule produced than do other fossil fuels and is thus said to be a “cleaner” fuel. This does not take into consideration greenhouse gases released during the drilling, fracturing, or production phases, or leakage of methane during the distribution phase. Because methane has up to thirty-three times the global-warming potential of carbon dioxide over a hundred-year horizon,
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leakage of methane is an important issue. Studies comparing the life cycle of methane with that of other fossil fuels disagree on whether natural gas is a cleaner fuel when leakages and other carbon emissions during production are considered.
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The only certainties are that insufficient data are available on whether methane is truly cleaner than other fossil fuels and that not all pathways of methane leakage have been considered. In particular, little is known about the full extent of methane leakage in the distribution system. We can argue about which fossil fuel is the cleanest, but the fact remains that the only way to slow climate change is to transition to energy sources that are proven to have
much
smaller carbon footprints.

So how do we overcome the difficulties of the energy transition? The often-heard refrain is that renewable energies such as solar and wind are unsustainable because they can only survive with government subsidies. This argument may be valid in the short term, but only because the competition, that is, the fossil fuel industry, has been supported by government subsidies and compensation for the last 150 years.
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Not the least of this support is the vast installed infrastructure for the distribution of fossil fuels, much of which was publically financed. Although there have been some efforts to rein in the power of the fossil fuel industry, such as the breakup of the Standard Oil monopoly in 1911, throughout much of its existence, the industry has enjoyed tax breaks, lax regulation, and outright contributions to its mission from federal, state, and local governments. The fact is that all energy sources receive government subsidies. When considering all the externalities (the cost of pollution, direct subsidies, etc.), the International Monetary Fund estimated that the sum of worldwide government subsidies to the oil and gas industry was on the order of $2.3 trillion for just the year 2011.
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In the years between 1950 and 2010, the oil, gas, and coal industries have received 70 percent of the energy subsidies provided by the US government, with most of the remainder going to the nuclear and hydropower industries.
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Consider a few extreme illustrations of the disparate government treatment of fossil fuels and renewables, from the federal and local levels. On the federal level, the invasion of Iraq, which had little or no benefit yet enormous cost to the US taxpayer, can only be seen through the lens of protecting oil supplies for multinational corporations. Imagine invading Germany if the US supply of inverters for solar installations were threatened. Meanwhile, on the local level, the installation of solar arrays and windmills is tightly regulated. In some states, it can take years to acquire a permit for a wind farm. In Pennsylvania, for example, the state legislature and governor attempted to remove the right of local governments to employ zoning to regulate the use of land for oil and gas exploration (Act 13); this restriction on local governments’ rights has now been at least temporarily reversed by the courts. In New York State, local control of land use for oil and gas exploration has been challenged in the courts (although by late 2013, local control had been consistently upheld),
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yet wind and solar installations are carefully scrutinized and tightly controlled by local authorities.

If the playing field were level, then perhaps the transition to renewable energies could proceed without government subsidies, but in the current world, that is unlikely. Nancy Pfund and Ben Healey, in their paper “What Would Jefferson Do? The Historical Role of Federal Subsidies in Shaping America’s Energy Future,”
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estimated that for the first fifteen years of subsidies (considering direct subsidies corrected for inflation), the nuclear industry received an average of 8-fold larger subsidy and the oil and gas industry a 4.5-fold greater subsidy than renewable energies. They concluded that Thomas Jefferson would have done “what our country has always done—support emerging energy technologies—to drive innovation, create jobs, protect our environment, enhance our national security in a time of rapid change, and to further a distinctly American way of life in which resources once thought to be endless are replaced by ones that actually are.”

But there remain several important obstacles, such as storage and distribution systems. The most difficult aspect of making the transition to renewable energy for electricity is that the sun does not always shine and the wind does not always blow. Other than batteries, effective storage systems are still under development, and the best existing solution is a better grid that distributes the load and renewable energy production intelligently over a wide area.
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On the positive side, the greatest demand for energy from the grid typically corresponds to when the sun is shining, and the highest winds often occur when the solar resources are minimal. This solution can allow us to rely more heavily on renewables. In parts of Germany, 30 to 50 percent of the energy in the grid is from renewables at peak times (with an average contribution of 23.5 percent to electricity use in 2012).
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But unfortunately, until better storage systems are available, a portion of US energy needs will be met with fossil-fuel-fired plants. The goal should be to reduce these nonrenewable energy sources as much as possible.

We have found that our own experiences with the impacts of gas drilling have had a profound influence on how we use and think about energy in our daily lives. Moving away from fossil fuels (including gas heaters, electricity from the grid, and petroleum in the car) can be done in two ways. By far the least expensive and most effective method is to use less energy. This is the low-hanging fruit that is easily harvested and can have a significant impact. The more expensive approach is to generate energy locally in a renewable manner. Everyone can participate in the first approach, and while the second is more difficult, it is also available to many people.

People can divide their direct energy needs into roughly three areas: electricity, heating, and transportation. By decreasing electricity use through lower-energy appliances, switchable power strips, and compact fluorescent and LED lighting, and by a concerted effort to turn off lights and appliances in our household, we have decreased our energy use by almost 50 percent. The remainder is now supplied by a modest grid-tied solar array (i.e., solar panels that supply electricity to our home and car and send any excess power to the electric utility grid). In our case, we will recoup our costs in about fifteen years. This required an up-front payment, but other alternatives are possible—for example, financing that arranges payments at approximately the cost of electricity.

Other options are springing up by grassroots efforts. For example, a community called Ecovillage
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in Ithaca has installed a grid-tied fifty-kilowatt solar array that is shared by the residents and produces about half of their electricity needs. Likewise, in Bainbridge Island, Washington, a community project includes a seventy-one-kilowatt solar array financed by twenty-four area families.
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These projects have been successful despite modest solar resources. Other communities are using bulk purchasing and negotiating with installers to provide lower-cost solar arrays to multiple households.
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Electricity generated by solar arrays can only be widely adopted in areas with net metering. That is, energy produced by the solar array is fed to the grid, and excess production is sold to the utility. Many permutations exist. In the state of New York, residents can bank excess production for one year and use that to offset electrical use. After one year, the resident is compensated for the remaining excess at the wholesale rate, which is considerably lower than the retail value of the electricity.
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The advantage of this arrangement is that the grid is used as storage system, and the more solar energy generated during peak-use hours (daytime), the less demand is placed on the grid. The downside is that residents are not encouraged to make more electricity than they use, as the compensation for making more electricity is minimal. More advanced schemes, such as that in use in Germany,
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have led to much greater adoption of photovoltaic technology.

But this is only part of the equation. In colder climates, heating is an important part of energy use, and the traditional choices have been either fossil fuels or electrical resistance. At the point of use, both methods of heating can be very efficient, but the production and distribution of the energy (electricity, methane, propane) lead to significant losses and environmental degradation. Fortunately, better solutions can exceed the efficiencies of traditional methods and are compatible with a cleaner energy future. Of course, the first solution should always be better insulation and passive solar heating where possible. A house designed to the German Passivhaus standard
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can require almost no supplemental heating or cooling in most climates. Taking it a step further, heat pumps can supply two to four times more energy than is taken from the grid or from solar arrays. The energy is moved either from the ground (ground-source heating, often mistakenly referred to as
geothermal heating
) or from the air (air-source heat pump) using the same principles used in refrigeration. This type of heat can be used in even very cold climates and is a perfect match for grid-tied solar arrays or wind energy. Alternatively, solar hot-water systems can be effective for heating domestic hot water and supplying some space-heating needs.

Finally, transportation may be one of the most difficult problems to solve, since our entire infrastructure is built around fossil fuels. Obviously, public transportation, ride sharing, and Internet commuting can help, but in many areas, private transportation is the only option. What’s more, many people, of course, don’t have the option of working from home. In terms of cost of operation after purchase, electric cars are by far superior but suffer from driving-range considerations and the pollution and carbon emissions generated by the electrical production. Nevertheless, in terms of carbon emissions, electric vehicles are better than gasoline-powered cars in all parts of the United States and better than hybrid vehicles (combined electric motor and gasoline-powered engine) in most states.
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Hybrid vehicles remove the range anxiety and are, in some areas where electrical generation is largely from coal, more carbon-friendly than electric vehicles. In our household, we use an electric car (Mitsubishi iMIEV) powered by solar panels for local trips and a hybrid car (Prius) for longer-distance travel. The additional cost of the hybrid Prius over a similar gasoline-powered car (about $4,000 in our case) is easily recovered in gasoline savings in six or seven years. With dealer incentives, the iMIEV was about the same price as the Prius, but the purchase was also eligible for a federal tax credit. This made the car very affordable. The efficiency of the electric motor and the fact that it is charged in large part by solar energy make both the carbon footprint and the vehicle’s operating cost extremely low. As a bonus, an electric motor easily outperforms standard four-cylinder gas engines on our steep, glacier-carved hills.

We have tried to present what we believe are serious health problems associated with fossil fuel extraction by illustrating recent cases from Pennsylvania. These are real people with real problems coping the best they can. But these are only a few illustrations of the problems that exist. They are by no means the only individuals that have dealt with the negative consequences of energy production, and we are continually learning about people whose lives have been affected. Our goal in writing this book is to call attention to these stories. We realize that in the short term, all of us will be to some extent dependent on fossil fuels, but we can do much better to ensure that when we enjoy a warm house or a warm meal, we are
not
doing so at the expense of our neighbor’s health. Regulations clearly vary among the states and among different countries, but ironically, in the states that are arguably the origin of the oil and gas industries (Pennsylvania and New York, respectively), the current or proposed regulations are some of the least effective on the planet. They do nothing to protect public health and little to protect the environment and are largely written by the industry being regulated.

We can do better than this. We must elect politicians who will write and enforce better regulations. Most importantly, the agencies responsible for enforcement cannot be those charged with promoting mineral extraction. This dual mission sets up unnecessary conflicts of interest that are not in the public interest but are, sadly, the norm in most states. So, the solution is better regulations and better enforcement of unconventional fossil fuel extraction in the states that allow this process. In states such as New York, which by early 2014 still did not permit unconventional extraction, the process should be banned until it can be proven to be safe through health impact assessments and definitive animal and human health studies. Most importantly, wherever we live, all of us must move beyond fossil fuels to a renewable energy future.