I am continuously amazed at how often this myth about a layer of impermeable rock between the Marcellus Shale and our surface waters keeps popping up. I tripped across the following comment by "ProperModulation" last night while reading articles published online earlier in the day:
By contrast, the Marcellus Shale is found thousands of feet down, in many areas more than a mile. In addition, the gas-bearing layers are sealed in by impermeable rock, or the gas would have leaked into surrounding soil. In other words, the shale gas reservoirs are isolated by rock and depth far below where our underground drinking water is found.
The article and comments can be viewed here.
Anyone who states there is such a layer is either totally clueless or a paid shill of the natural gas industry. For hopefully the final time, I'll refer to a prior post which pretty much blows this myth away. Further to this point, I hope everyone realizes that if I fabricated any of Dr. Engelder's comments, I would have been contacted by some lawyers representing the good Dr. and/or PSU by now.
Hasn't happened - and it won't. WYSIWIG...verbatim.
There is no such thing as an impermeable cap layer above the Marcellus Shale, and with thousands of new wells being planned, the number of paths for water (laced with nasty chemicals) to migrate to and contaminate our aquifers will increase exponentially as each new well is fracked. Period.
The natural gas industry knows this, but they're hoping they'll be long gone from the area before the true extent of the damage they will leave behind becomes brutally evident to future generations.
Problem is, they've seriously miscalculated on two major fronts; the highly fractured subsurface geology of the northeast...and the rock-solid resolve of the people who live here.
I got my charm & pleasant demeanor from my G-G-Grandfather,
Sam Williams.
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