Fracking can wait, according to the state Senate, which late Aug. 3 overwhelmingly passed a moratorium on the controversial method of extracting natural gas from deep deposits of shale.
Saying water is even more precious than natural gas, state Sen. John Bonacic, R-New Hope, was among the senators who voted in favor of a one-year moratorium on issuing state permits for the natural gas extraction procedure hydraulic fracturing, widely known as fracking.
The measure passed the state Senate in a late-night vote near the end of a special session, where the body finally concluded work on a state budget that was legally due by April 1. While the budget only passed by a 32-30 vote, the moratorium passed with 48 votes.
The bill must be considered by the state Assembly, which is expected to be called back into session by Gov. David Paterson to complete unfinished business in September. It is uncertain what priority the fracking moratorium will hold on the Assembly agenda.
Fracking is the practice of extracting natural gas from ultra-deep wells by injecting a hydraulic slurry of sand and liquids into organic-rich rock deposits and freeing natural gas otherwise trapped thousands of feet underground. It is a relatively new and controversial technique that energy companies want to use regionally for extracting natural gas from the formerly inaccessible geologic formation known as Marcellus Shale, running as deep as 7,000 feet underground. Where the process has been tried, stories of earthquakes, fouled wells and flaming water taps spring forth with the natural gas.
According to state maps, this geologic formation underlies roughly the entire western half of Ulster County, all of Sullivan County and the southwest corner of Orange County and runs westward along the Southern Tier counties and into Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio. Marcellus Shale is the largest known source of natural gas in the country, with perhaps as much as 500 trillion cubic feet held underground. New York state currently uses about 1.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas annually. In 2005, it sold for roughly $10 per thousand cubic feet in the state.
Critics contend the practice of fracking is fraught with environmental peril, since companies use a toxins they refuse to identify as part of the slurry to crack open the gas deposits and the process requires millions of gallons of water to extract the gas. The federal Environmental  Protection Agency is currently doing a study to determine the effects of the procedure, whose potent problems have been vividly illustrated in the HBO documentary “Gasland,” which among other footage shows a homeowner in Pennsylvania near gas wells where fracking has been used, igniting into flame  the water from his kitchen faucet.
With increasingly well organized opponents to fracking urging state lawmakers to enact a moratorium until more is known about the effects of the procedure, the issue is becoming a political hot button, especially for senators such as Bonacic, much of whose  district overlays Marcellus Shale formations.
Bonacic cited “Gasland” as an influential entry into the public relations war between opponents and supporters of fracking, and said ultimately caution is the best policy when it comes to a technique that could spoil drinking water for millions of New Yorkers. He said the natural gas deposits are not going to be lost while the state and federal government study whether fracking is a safe method to access the natural gas.
