Posted on 03/13/2013 8:15:52 AM PDT by Sir Napsalot
For more than four years, New York has had a moratorium on fracking, the controversial technique for extracting natural gas. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has long insisted that science, not politics, will dictate his decision about whether to lift the ban, and his administration has missed several self-imposed deadlines as they gather more scientific input. In fact, the State Assembly just approved a two-year extension of the moratorium until there is conclusive scientific evidence on environmental and health risks. Reportedly, this most recent delay stemmed from Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who convinced Cuomo to wait for results from an ongoing study in Pennsylvania.
All of this goes to show that fracking, like most environmental controversies, is being treated as a scientific issue. This is understandable, because important questions surround the process of injecting millions of gallons of water laced with chemicals (some of them not publicly identified) deep into the earth to make natural gas embedded in shale formations accessible. What, for example, does this do to groundwater and air quality?
The weight of these questions is enough to make you think that crafting policy is a matter of getting the science right. And indeed both sides of the debate proclaim, Let the science decide!
But I actually think politics, not science, should dictate outcomes, because the larger questions at stake with fracking are about values: How much risk is acceptable? How do we weigh competing goods? What is the proper place of humans in nature? In short, what kind of world do we want to live in and pass down to our children? These questions are not reducible to science..... That decision depends on how we want to balance the goals of safety, community character, and access to mineral rights.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
FOR
THE
CHILDREN
Right off the pages of Rand’s Anthem.
Politics is deciding the fact of fracking particularly in New York.
This sudden shift tells me we are about to hear that studies reveal fracking is actually not a threat to the environment.
Does this apply to “climate change”?
Oh wait. Everything is decided by politics, not science and certainly not the rule of law.
Politics is deciding it here in PA too, though not as the Left would like (Democrat politicians are walking around drooling just at the thought of all the new revenue streams)
Let's also add in the need for heating oil in the winter to the list of aesthetic priorities.
Recommendation from Slate: Just let this guy decide what is best.
To the left, it is their roadmap (to a totalitarian dystopia).
It's the "deep into the earth" that strikes me. Maybe I'm mistaken, but I wasn't aware the groundwater was present at the depths these fracking companies operate. Below is an image from wikipedia indicating the fracking is below aquifer levels.
Meanwhile, the Dakotas get richer as New York gets poorer.
Influx of people into the rich Dakotas makes it a real (somewhat real?) possibility of Alaska v2.
Since we’re substituting science as a determining factor with considerations we personally think are worthy, I’m going to propose we decide based on economics.
How about this one. Let’s decide based on private property rights. You know, freedom.
Yup. You nailed it. From the author of the article:
I happen to share that perspective. I believe that going to such extremes to prolong our addiction to fossil fuels is a grave mistake.
Oh, I get it...when it concerns global warming, then we must rely on the scientists to tell us what to do. But when it comes to energy exploration, we must rely on the politicians to tell us what to do. Yeah, that’s great logic. (snicker)
this is an insane, dishonest standard. You can never prove the negative, ie. that there is "conclusive scientific evidence" that there are no environmental or health risks. It's a impossible hurdle. The burden is on those who would claim there ARE environmental and health risks and if they can't prove that to a reasonable degree of certainty then you go ahead and extract the gas.
According to my vast research on earthquakes (I saw the movie Earthquake with Charlton Heston), since there’s a fault line, shouldn’t one side of the fault line have all the layers shifted in one direction or other?
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