Colin McCormick
ENGL 306
Doctor Brown
12/9/16
Persuasive Essay
Dear Fracking Companies,
I am sure that all of the companies
involved in the process of fracking are well aware of how the fracking process uses
a high pressure mixture of chemicals and water to release oils and gasses
trapped deep underground. Although
this method may be affective in extracting natural resources, providing large
quantities of energy and providing jobs, it also has many drawbacks, some of
which are: water contamination, water depletion, air pollution and earthquakes.
For example, for water
contamination alone there has been “over 1,000 documented cases of water
contamination” in locations that are close to fracking sites, along with many
cases involving “sensory, respiratory and neurological damage” (Loki, Reynard).
These negative aspects to
fracking, will only serve to speed up the depletion of natural resources, as
well as have a huge detrimental effect on the environment if left unchecked.
Therefore by allowing the use of fracking as an extraction process, it is in turn
supporting the destruction and contamination of the Earth.
Paragraph Structure
1. The purpose of the following paragraph is to inform the audience on the
topic of water contamination as it pertains to fracking and why contaminated
water is such a big problem.
2. The main characters are: Water Contamination, water
3. Focused Topic String
Water contamination is
one of the biggest problems concerning fracking, obviously water is one of our
most precious resources and because of this, there is no margin for error when
dealing with the quality and quantity of the water we as humans can use. Therefore it is
concerning when it
takes “40,000 gallons of 600 different kinds chemicals” (Gibson, Carl) to run
each fracking well, and even more concerning when one looks at the “360 BILLION
gallons” (Gibson, Carl) of chemicals it
takes to run all the fracking wells in the United States. Of the 600 chemicals mixed with the water
(some of which are: formaldehyde, mercury, uranium, and hydrochloric acid) about
30 to 50 percent of them are “reclaimed”, whereas the rest of the chemicals are
left underground. This
amount of toxicity left in the ground near water sources is what leads to water
contamination (i.e. water contaminated with mercury, uranium etc.) and is one
of the main reasons why opposition against fracking is so high. “Pennsylvania,
a major fracking state, has just admitted that fracking has contaminated local
water supplies 243 times in 22 counties” (Gibson, Carl). From this excerpt it
is clear that water contamination
is a huge issue for fracking companies, the fact that the water has been contaminated
that many times in one state should be a red flag that there is an issue with
the process that is being used.
Paragraph Structure
1. The purpose of the following paragraph is to present facts based on the
amount of water being used in the fracking industry. This paragraph also serves
to play on the recipients pathos, in hopes that the recipient will feel guilty
about the over usage of water.
2. The main characters are: water, water quantity, fracking, drought
3. Chained Topic String
Not only is
the quality of water
a problem when fracking
wells are involved, but also the quantity of water being used for said wells. In the United
States each fracking
site takes up to eight million gallons of water to finish, when all 500,000 of the U.S’s fracking wells are counted
for, at 18 fracks per
site, it comes out to a massive 72 trillion gallons of water in order for the fracking sites to remain
operational (Gibson, Carl). This large amount of water needed to remain up and running takes away water from industries
that need it just as badly, such as livestock and agriculture. For example, in
Texas there is a major drought
occurring, which in turn causes livestock and crops to die and food prices to
go up due to scarcity of water.
In towns within Texas, specifically next to Eagle Ford Shale they are seeing 45
to 50 percent of the water being used coming from fracking sites (Gibson, Carl). This high water usage is highly
irresponsible, seeing as “more than 90 percent of the water used in fracking well never returns to the surface”
(Loki, Reynard). Due to this, the water is unable to rejoin the water cycle because it is trapped so far beneath
the earth, which is bad for any states experiencing a drought that are relying
on rainfall to replenish their stores.
Besides just
having an effect on the quality and quantity of water, fracking also
contributes to causing earthquakes. Oklahoma for example has hundreds of
fracking sites, and now they are more likely to have an earthquake than
California. From 1990 to 2008 there were only three earthquakes that year that
measured a 3.0 or more on the Richter scale in Oklahoma. In 2013 that number
rose to 109 earthquakes, and in 2014 it rose even more to 238 earthquakes
(Gibson, Carl). This correlation between the number of earthquakes and the
amount of fracking shows very well that this type of resource can have
detrimental effects on the environments in which it occurs. The earthquakes
that have and do occur from this process have the possibility to be very
destructive, in Oklahoma City there were fourteen homes that were destroyed
from earthquakes caused by drilling. “EPA seismologists acknowledge a very
clear correlation between fracking and earthquakes, saying the quakes would
stop as soon as wells were turned off” (Gibson, Carl).
The process
of fracking like many things can be seen in two lights, on one hand yes,
fracking does provide access to an abundant amount of natural resources, as
well as providing jobs for many people. On the other hand it can also
contaminate water, overuse water, promote earthquakes, and be a very destructive
force. All of these problems then link themselves to other issues and just like
dominoes, everything falls. As the Earth’s environment falls farther into
decline, we as humans must ask ourselves if the ends justify the means in the
fight for natural resources.
Purpose for
Conclusion
The purpose of my conclusion was to
evoke pathos in the reader, by attempting to show them that this is just as
much their problem as it is mine. I chose to write the conclusion in this way
because I wanted to leave the reader almost feeling ‘bad’ that this is occurring.
Works Cited
News, Carl Gibson Reader Supported. "9 Good Reasons to
Ban Fracking Immediately." Reader
Supported News. N.p., 12 Oct. 2014.
Web. 09 Dec. 2016.
Lallanilla, Marc. "Facts About Fracking."
LiveScience. Purch, 23 Jan. 2015. Web. 09 Dec. 2016.
Loki, Reynard. "8 Dangerous Side Effects of Fracking
That the Industry Doesn't Want You to
Hear About." Alternet. Independent Media
Institute, 28 Apr. 2015. Web. 09 Dec. 2016
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