Fracking

High volume hydraulic fracturing or ‘fracking’, is a controversial technology used for extracting oil or gas resources which are trapped in shale rocks, coal seams and similar deposits. In the US, where fracking is carried out extensively, there are many examples of fracking causing chemical pollution leading to health and environmental impacts.

Fracking operations require large numbers of wells, and need substantial volumes of water and chemicals. This chemical use, combined with the substances that flowback from underground, makes fracking a potentially significant source of air, land and water pollution.

Due to our concerns about fracking, CHEM Trust commissioned a detailed examination of the chemical pollution impacts of fracking.

The findings of this examination are summarised in our briefing “Fracking pollution: How toxic chemicals from fracking could affect wildlife and people in the UK and EU“, which also includes discussion of the latest developments and includes our recommendations for the future.

For a more in-depth examination of the evidence, see our detailed “Chemical Pollution from Fracking” report.

The briefing and report were launched on 21st June 2015 with a press release. On 23rd July we responded to misleading criticism of the report from the UK fracking industry trade association.

See our latest blog posts on fracking with this link: https://www.chemtrust.org/tag/fracking/

If you are involved in campaigning on fracking you may find our ‘campaigning on fracking’ page useful.