Fracking the Neighborhood

What happens when natural gas drilling moves into an urban area: how communities in North Texas responded to the environmental and health threats of fracking.When natural gas drilling moves into an urban or a suburban neighborhood, a two-hundred-foot-high drill appears on the other side of a back yard fence and diesel trucks clog a quiet two-lane residential street. Children seem to be having more than the usual number of nosebleeds. There are so many local cases of cancer that the elementary school starts a cancer support group. In this book, Jessica Smartt Gullion examines what happens when natural gas extraction by means of hydraulic fracturing, or "e;fracking,"e; takes place not on wide-open rural land but in a densely populated area with homes, schools, hospitals, parks, and businesses. Gullion focuses on fracking in the Barnett Shale, the natural-gas-rich geological formation under the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. She gives voice to the residents-for the most part educated, middle class, and politically conservative-who became reluctant anti-drilling activists in response to perceived environmental and health threats posed by fracking.Gullion offers an overview of oil and gas development and describes the fossil-fuel culture of Texas, the process of fracking, related health concerns, and regulatory issues (including the notorious "e;Halliburton loophole"e;). She chronicles the experiences of community activists as they fight to be heard and to get the facts about the safety of fracking.Touted as a greener alternative and a means to reduce dependence on foreign oil, natural gas development is an important part of American energy policy. Yet, as this book shows, it comes at a cost to the local communities who bear the health and environmental burdens.