PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE: …While the threat of water pollution from fracking is not the focus of the EPA’s new standards, they deal with an aspect of the operation that is part of the debate and can’t be ignored — air pollution.
According to the agency, some of the largest air emissions in the oil and gas industry occur at gas wells that have been fracked. At one stage of production, frack fluids, water and gas come to the surface at high velocity and volume in a process that typically lasts three to 10 days. The mixture contains smog-forming volatile organic compounds, methane (a strong greenhouse gas) and air toxics such as benzene, ethylbenzene and n-hexane.
Under the new rules, the air will become cleaner in a big payoff for public health. The proposed standards, the result of a consent decree after the EPA was sued, will be the subject of three public hearings, one of them in the Pittsburgh area… (more)
