Fractured by fracking?

Over the past few months, we have written repeatedly about the potential impact of gas drilling on the natural environment and human health. But the human environment consists not only of nature, but of social and community systems. We take these systems for granted, which makes it hard to see how they might change given a physical event like the advent of gas drilling. But as more and more information emerges in the public discussion, it has become clear that the impact of drilling on factors such as schools, housing, crime, healthcare and everyday interactions with our neighbors will be profound.

How could it affect schools? Well, as supervisor Tina Palacek of Highland has noted, the heavy truck traffic along back roads could have an impact on school bus trips and routing. Damage inflicted on the roads will make the surfaces less safe, while the heavy truck traffic potentially bringing water and toxic fluids for fracking in—and used fluids out—could create dangers and delays to local traffic, including school buses.

The itinerant crews brought in to work on the drilling pads would introduce a new element into the social structure that could have a wide variety of impacts. One is the affordability of housing. Peggy Utesch of Rilfe, CO, at a forum held on June 27, recounted how the need to house these high-paid workers drove up rental costs in her area and made it impossible for lower-paid residents to afford rents any more. The effect rippled further when several stores scheduled to open at a local mall could not do so because they had counted on those locals as employees. She also said that her area experienced increases in prostitution, drug use and crime in general along with the onrush of gas drilling.

The types of injuries and accidents suffered by crews working on the drills and wells would also put new burdens on our healthcare system and emergency response services. In the case of Utesch’s community, the local hospital lacked a burn unit and was unable to deal with the injuries resulting from gas fires.

One final social cost is perhaps the most obvious: the fracturing of the community along lines of pro- and anti-, haves and have-nots, the people who think gas drilling is a great idea because they expect to make a mint out of it, and their neighbors who will get none of the monetary benefits but will have to suffer the costs—aesthetics, health, property value destruction, unsafe roads and higher taxes due to increased infrastructure needs.

But the broad and intricate network of effects of natural gas drilling makes it all the more urgent that we do not let ourselves be fractured along any of these lines. What is needed now more than ever is a coordinated effort that can connect all the strands. That means all the disparate groups now addressing the issue—from property owners’ organizations to environmental protection groups to local government to state and federal agencies—are going to have to come together to develop a systematically coordinated plan to manage and plan for the impacts. It also means that we could use some professional help to do so.

One idea would be to take the process used by the Town of Liberty in its recent redevelopment plan as a model. Funded by Alan Gerry, Liberty worked with Cornell University in a program that engaged university students, under the guidance of their professors, to analyze the planning problems and come up with some comprehensive solutions. Columbia University is another institution that has engaged comprehensive planning projects, and that might be approached for help. The fact that Columbia is headquartered in New York City, which someday soon may wake up to the fact that its water supply will now be located in an industrial zone, might make the city all the more interested and even attract some much-needed funding and planning help.

The one thing we cannot do—even those of us who are in favor of gas drilling—is to assume that the great gas rush will leave this area pretty much the same, only richer. Our home is going to change in more ways than we have even yet imagined, and we must work together to design and manage the impacts by minimizing the negative and maximizing the potential that this gas rush will have on ourselves and coming generations.

Also in this issue:

• Dumping the dump continues stupid policies

Dr. Punnybone

Hannibal Lecture