Researchers recently put out a subject field about how to draw fracking fluid . The idea was to cipher out how to discover potential groundwater contamination . And then the mass medium spin cycle create a giant mess .
The trouble was a medium rumor that all the fluid used in hydraulic fracturing cognitive process is harmless . But the scientist at the University of Colorado Boulder had never reached that conclusion .
Anarticlein the Boulder Weekly does a splendid task at retracing the game of telephony that led the press to distort the findings of the subject area , which was published in the journal Analytical Chemistry .
The goal of the research , conducted by E. Michael Thurman and Imma Ferrer , was square . Thus far , efforts to determine the extent to which fracking might foul groundwater have been stymie by oil and gas companies , who have been reluctant to share on the button what ’s in their proprietary fluid mixtures . And while state and federal regulations need companies to disclose what is being used in their fracking fluids , the resulting lean typically apply broad chemic category to describe the real ingredients .
The scientist developed a technique at the university ’s mass spectrometry science lab that allowed them to on the nose describe some of the chemicals . Thurman said , “ We found chemicals in the sample we were running that most of us are putting down our drains at home . ”
Unfortunately , that assertion prompted the university to make out apress releasewith the misleading newspaper headline , “ Major grade of fracking chemical no more toxic than common household substances . ”
“ There were quite a few news wall plug that missed the note that we were trying to make about it being one class of chemicals — it ’s an important class of chemicals , but it ’s not all the chemicals , and essentially [ headlines ] left the impression that all chemicals in fracking fluid were safe , ” Laura Snider , the University of Colorado medium copulation faculty member and generator of the original closet handout , told the Boulder Weekly . “ Ultimately , I feel like the news spill is precise . I experience like if I had to write again , I probably would make some thing more clear or make some thing that were down lower up higher , I guess . But I find like it ’s all in there . ”
The initial mansion that all was not well come in the form of headphone calls to the researcher from perplexed environmental journalists . Colorado State University ’s news web site , Source , then worked with the researchers to put out a story that provided a more accurate accounting of their findings .
But , as the Boulder Weekly report :
The media bombination had already run away with CU ’s very dissimilar story .
The Boulder Daily Camera ’s front page newspaper headline the day following the CU pressure release declare , “ CU field of study : Fracking smooth toxicity minimum : Researchers say liquid no more dangerous than household mathematical product . ” This headline and the first paragraph of the storey omit the fact that the researchers hit the books only about one - fifth of the chemicals in the fracking liquid samples they prove .
The Colorado Oil and Gas Association also seized on the photographic camera ’s misleading newspaper headline when it pinch that the enquiry adds evidence to COGA ’s previous statements that fracking mobile perniciousness is “ minimal , ” and “ no more toxic than vulgar menage product . ”
Thurman works in the Center for Environmental Mass Spectrometry at the University of Colorado ’s Department of Environmental Engineering as does his fellow research worker , Ferrer . They are n’t toxicologist , he emphasize , they ’re environmental chemist .
“ We were n’t out to find whether the [ chemicals ] were toxic or not , ” he says . “ In the military press departure , [ Snider ] write the Bible toxic in there , but that was n’t our goal and we did n’t do any tests to ascertain toxicity . … What she wrote was not incorrect , but that was n’t the purpose of the study . ”
Thurman ’s focus was on discover what percent of the chemicals in flowback pee from fracking operations are surfactants and to key out what type of surfactants were being used and produce what is basically a fingerprint of those chemical that can be traced .
wetter are known element for hydraulic fracturing jobs , and are listed on FracFocus ’s Chemical Disclosure Registry website . Thurman and Ferrer had previously researched surfactants , and had the official document necessary to study them .
“ We thought , this is a year of compounds that we can analyze , so permit ’s find out what portion of the organic materials that they add to the well are add up out of the surfactants . So that was end one , ” he pronounce . “ And end two was could any of these wetter be used to fingerprint the individual wells themselves . ”
The results supply a tool other labs can use to determine if groundwater has been pollute by fracking trading operations nearby and , if there are multiple companies operating in the domain , possibly identify which company ’s frack fluid had entered the groundwater .
“ That , to me , is the valuable portion [ of the inquiry ] , ” Thurman says . “ The perniciousness question revolves around a lot of other compounds that are in there . There ’s biocides tot up and there ’s other chemical compound that maybe we have n’t figured out yet , and who live about how toxic they might be . ”
you could scan the full news report at theBoulder Weekly .
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