Meet Louis Meeks -- a longtime landowner outside the picturesque rural community of Pavillion, Wyoming. The rolling hillsides here have hosted natural gas wells for decades, but the pace of activity has increased in recent years with the growth of the drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Something else has increased over the last couple of years -- nasty problems that Meeks blames on drilling. Meeks says his tap water now smells like diesel fuel. And his efforts to clean up his water supply over time have been to no avail. He won't let his granddaughter take baths or wash her clothes when she comes to his home. In frustration, Meeks finally printed up business cards that show a glass of tap water with the words "Fresh, fizzy...fracked." He wants them out to anyone and everyone who will listen. No, Louis Meeks is not imagining things. To the contrary, a draft report by scientists working for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, published in December, confirmed on paper what the residents in Pavillion already knew -- that groundwater here has been contaminated by hazardous chemicals that are linked to fracking and the production of natural gas. It was a very significant ...
↧
