Should Fracking be legal in the United States? Structured Debate video: Structured Debate Part 1: Clarifying Questions:

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1 Should Fracking be legal in the United States? Structured Debate video: Introductory Clips: Yes (pro) No (Con) Structured Debate Part 1: Yes (pro) No (Con) Clarifying Questions:

2 Structured Debate Part 2: Yes (pro) No (Con) Clarifying Questions: What similarities in opinion does your group have? What differences? Does your group think that Walmart is good or bad for America? Reflection: Answer all the questions. Did your opinion change at all throughout the debate? Which pieces of evidence did you find most compelling? What do you think now? Which pieces of evidence support your opinion? Which pieces do you think were less compelling?

3 Fracking Pro There are enough fossil fuels locked in bedrock shale formations under North American soil to make the United States energy independent, and a net exporter of oil and gas, in the near future. Tapping those energy sources would make the United States less dependent, economically and politically, on unstable countries such as Venezuela and the Middle East. It would also enable the West to be less dependent on Russian natural gas, which Vladimir Putin currently uses as a political lever. The natural gas industry claims that fracking is safe because the shale formations lie far below the water table and pose a minimal threat to groundwater. They also claim that drilling for oil and gas is nothing new: we ve been drilling for oil and gas for decades. Using natural gas to heat our homes and power our cars releases far fewer carbon emissions than coal. Proponents describe the growing natural gas industry as an environmentally pragmatic bridge fuel that will buy time until we can harness the power of wind, solar and hydro on a mass scale. In places like Kalkaska County, the oil and gas industry is big business, providing hundreds of jobs. Many of those contractor and subcontractor jobs are tied to fracking.

4 Fracking Pro (2) - Much more available natural gas in places that employ fracking, most notably the United States. This massive increase in supply means much lower prices, it also means less need to import natural gas. - Fracking will increase energy independence and energy security. It will also lead to natural gas being substituted for coal, which is a net win on all sorts of pollutants, including carbon dioxide. Natural gas burns much cleaner than gasoline and diesel, is cheaper, and does not have to transported halfway around the world with all the risks associated with freighter transport. - Natural gas (and also the Natural Gas Liquids that are coincident in "wet" gas wells") is also an important chemical feedstock used in the production of all manner of plastics and other chemicals with applications from consumer packaging to medicine. Since US natural gas is cheaper, the low priced feedstocks make US chemical producers costcompetitive relative to their foreign competitors. Thus, even outside the energy markets, shale gas drilling has already begun to improve employment and the trade balance of the United States. - As a result of the fracking boom, the US has already surpassed Saudi Arabia in net energy production. The US is well on its way to becoming energy self-sufficient, which means declining imports, less chance of shipping accidents, and a huge dividend in the reduction of capital being sent abroad to purchase our energy needs. - The UK has recently embraced fracking to access what are believed to be enormous deposits in the north and the south. Poland is actively exploring fracking in an effort to free itself from the Russian bear. - The US, unlike any other nation in the world, has the ingenuity, the imperative, and the capital to refine this technology to use less and less water, to do it safely.

5 Fracking Con Because fracking involves pumping a concoction of water, sand and chemicals into the ground to break apart the bedrock, environmentalists and private landowners worry that those chemicals could reach, and poison, the groundwater. Companies are not required to disclose the chemicals they use, or the formula of the mixture, in the process. That makes it difficult for local residents, or first responders, to prepare for an accident or emergency, and difficult for scientists to gauge the threat posed by the chemicals. In Michigan, as many as 35 million gallons of freshwater are removed from nearby aquifers per frack well the highest rate in the nation. The Anglers of the Au Sable, a Michigan environmental conservation group, and others, worry that this will deplete freshwater sources and potentially dry up rivers and streams that are key to Michigan s ecological health. Water for fracking is typically transported to well sites using heavy trucks, which turn pristine rural areas into industrial highways. The fracking, itself, is conducted day and night, causing both noise and light pollution for some nearby residents. The stakes are rising. According to environmental groups, energy company Encana s push for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality to allow resource play hubs (multiple drilling wells from the same site) could exponentially deplete the local water supply.

6 Fracking Con (2) - Creates minor earthquakes (2 on the Richter scale) ( Possible future earthquakes with structural damage to buildings) - Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, contributing the global warming, Fracking, like all energy extraction methods, is invasive and holds the potential for "bad actors" to cause collateral environmental damage, as happened in the early days in Pennsylvania in the Marcellus Shale. - Low-cost gas hampers the development of the renewable sector (Low-cost gas stops efforts on energy efficiency) - Water needs to be cleaned or there is a risk of water contamination - Impact on local economy & tourism, the areas turn into industrial waste sights and tourism goes down, so the area loses money. - The explosion of oil and natural gas supplies in the US will continue to tax our transportation infrastructure: pipelines, rail, truck routes, and so on. And, as others have noted, there is the potential of a glut of supply that could depress prices to the point that drillers and producers will stop drilling and producing, although demand is expected to continue to soar worldwide. - In some areas, drilling has become so prolific that there is no place to store the gas and it is being flared off (burned), which is a waste and also a source of pollution.