Halliburton Tries to Greenwash Fracking | Environment | Change.org

Halliburton Tries to Greenwash Fracking | Environment | Change.org
Hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” is the natural gas drilling technique rapidly spreading across the nation. It has already enabled drilling or exploration in 30 states. And in the last week, regardless of where you live, fracking finally arrived in your area. Specifically in your living room: CBS featured fracking on its CSI and 60 Minutes shows.

The CSI episode was over the top – par for the CSI course. Employees of a natural gas giant (ostensibly modeled after Halliburton) were killed after talking to a reporter about how fracking had poisoned their families. Then, instead of telling his story to the police, a nearby farmer dramatically blew himself up at gunpoint by throwing a match into his now flammable well after the water had killed his dear wife and beloved goats.

Yet drinking water is a serious topic, so the 60 Minutes episode featured an interview with Chesapeake Energy CEO Aubrey McClendon. Counterpoints were offered by the Sierra Club’s Michael Brune and residents of Pennsylvania and Texas whose water was poisoned by fracking. My favorite part was when Mr. McClendon said, “if you take away one thing from this interview” it should be that “you don’t want to drink frac fluid.” There are some things that just cannot be spun.

…But that doesn’t mean people won’t try. On Monday, Halliburton announced that it has developed a new “first-of-its-kind fracture fluid system comprised of materials sourced entirely from the food industry.”

Please examine their word choice: not “nontoxic chemicals,” just feedstocks based on materials associated with food that they seem to hope you will assume are edible. Not so.