Keep Tap Water Safe

In a Rodale Institute survey concluded in 2010, among Pennsylvanians who say they are very or somewhat aware of fracking, 40% are “very concerned” and nearly 30% are “somewhat concerned” about its effect on water quality. Concerns about fracking and water quality are bipartisan, including 57% of Republicans, 74% ofIndependents, and 86% of Democrats.* SOURCE: Survey: Red State or Blue, Most People Are Concerned About Fracking’s Effect On H2O, Article by Leah Zerbe, Rodale.com

Nationally, the Energy issue seems to divide democrats and republicans. Fracking, however, which is negatively impacting another more valuable resource – water –  seems to spill over party lines in Pennsylvania.  Yet, with all the discussion about Energy these days, there is a disproportionately small amount of attention paid to the Fresh Water Security of the 15.6 million people who rely on the Delaware River Watershed. Regardless of political affiliation, we need to wake up to the fact that we’ll run out of fresh water long before we burn up all the fracked natural gas in Pennsylvania.

Fracking depletes and pollutes water supplies in many ways, and we cannot have a truly logical discussion about ENERGY in our state without discussing WATER. If further privatization of water utilities is the future for Pennsylvania, then I’d like to know who is protecting our fresh water resources upstream, as well as down the line? We need to direct our thrust investment spending in the direction of Renewables, Conservation and Efficiency Standards, not on polluting, dangerous natural gas. And given that Republicans and Democrats appear to agree on this issue, doesn’t it truly “stink” that our governor continues to resist implementing a PA Natural Gas Drilling tax?

Tags: Rodale

This entry was posted on April 19, 2011 at 10:23 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.