Wetlands oil rain sludge, “bundled” in water for several years. When this happens, it starts seeping into groundwater and streams, eventually contaminating the water supply and harming fish, wildlife and aquifers.
“At that time there was some concern over what would happen if the oil sludge seeped down into freshwater, but it turned out it didn’t,” says Robert Smith, executive director of the Wetlands Oil and Gas Project.
In 2013, Smith and colleagues discovered that the oil seeped through bedrock layers of groundwater in five out of the six states we studied. It예스 카지노 had to do with sludge-rich sediment floating in deep water and being carried down rivers, says David Wray, the study’s lead author.
“I think you see this happening with a lot of oil industry operations, particularly in shallow aquifers,” says Wray, a professor at Rutgers University. “We were aware of this problem for many years, but until we actually measured it first, it was unknown how widespread it was.”
The study showed that oil production in shallow aquifers has declined in recent decades, but there hasn’t been an impact on local communities in these places.
So why do oil drillers keep dredging up more and more oil? At first glance it looks like the industry wants the groundwater to stay as pristine as it is, says Smith.
But, he says, oil drilling isn’t the only reason. “If you go down a drill target, there’s usually a lot of oil on it,” Smith says. “You’re drilling in a way that there’s going to be an oil spill, too. And if there’s a spill that comes out, the oil-shale gas industry will probably use it as an excuse to drill more oil.”
In addition to oil, the oil industry is u온 카지노sing natural gas and coal to fill up shallow aquifers, says Dr. Peter Poulin, an oil and gas engineer at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who studies the impacts of oil drilling. And, Poulin says, fracking can be particularly detrimental to local co라이브카지노mmunities because of the proximity of natural gas and coal.
“One of the problems with oil is that oil is really dispersed out there,” Poulin says. “In some areas, it’s not going to stay pristine forever. It’s going to go into groundwater. This is the ultimate result of oil extraction. You have to find a way to spread the oi