Why Letting An Oil Company Frack In Your Backyard Is Actually An Awesome Idea (cha and ching)

Business Insider ^ | 10/15/2012 | Rob Wile

[SeekAndFind]

Sure, the evidence appears to be growing that fracking may pose an environmental hazard.

But what if someone told you that you could make millions by letting an oil company frack your backyard?

Last year, states paid out more than $54 billion in royalties to landowners whose property was fracked for oil and gas, according to data from the National Association of Royalty Owners.

"There are millionaires being made everyday from North Dakota to Pennsylvania," Jerry Simmons, director of the NARO, told us.

So how do you get a chunk of that change?

We spoke to Jerry, as well as Jackie Root, an NARO rep in Pennsylvania, and put together the nine things you must have in your pocket before you become an overnight millionaire.

You must own the mineral rights on your property

If you do not, you will probably earn nothing. It's not enough to own what's on the surface. If you're not sure, you'll have to go to your county's courthouse and make sure that your deed includes rights to whatever lies beneath your property. Root says that in Pennsylvania, the mineral rights trump surface rights, and a driller can begin digging directly on your property.

And you must own a lot of it

You will get an up-front lease bonus if you own mineral rights. But you'll only get a couple hundred dollars if you don't own enough acres (as in, hundreds) where a company wants to drill. Acres are calculated at the surface (don't worry, only in rare circumstances are there different owners for different layers beneath the surface).

[hsrazorback1]

“frack in your backyard”

Giggity.

[Cowgirl of Justice]

(Whistling while putting up signs with big arrows pointing to our farms, ‘Frackers Welcome!!!’)

[Myrddin]

What could go wrong? See link

You could even have your own fishing hole if things work out just right. See link

Fracking is a wonderful way to improve yield from an oil and/or gas field, but it isn't without consequences.

[ponygirl]

When I went to see Atlas Shrugged this past weekend, they previewed an upcoming Matt Damon movie about the horrors of fracking. Looks like they’re even going with the old “burning well water” crap. You know, that YouTube video that was proven to be a hoax? I think it’s called “Promised Land” or something like that. ::eye roll::

[workerbee]

I don’t really understand what “fracking” is, but I know it was enough of an issue that it prompted my nephew — born & raised in West Central PA — to declare a geology major in college.

I hope that’s a good thing. He got a free ride, brain that he is.

[okie01]

I don’t really understand what “fracking” is...

Means "fracturing". Accomplished by lowering explosive charges into the drill hole and setting them off, so as to fracture the adjoining rock formation, allowing any hydrocarbons trapped therein to flow more freely -- into the drill hole. Includes injection of granular substances like sand into the fractures -- so as to keep them open.

The process has been common in Southwestern oil fields since the fifties. The only difference today is that it's being employed in concert with horizontal drilling -- so that the fracturing can occur along, say, a 3,000 ft horizontal stretch of productive formation rather than a 50 ft vertical depth.

[bgill]

For a few million, they can do whatever they want in my back yard.

[mountainlion]

I would rather have fracking than having to walk. Many people frack water wells around here. I never heard of a blowout and they are 600 to 1000 feet deep here. I would rather have fracking and reasonable oil than a communist government.

[EnquiringMind]

Baby got frack!

[BfloGuy]

Fracking is a wonderful way to improve yield from an oil and/or gas field, but it isn't without consequences.

Is that picture supposed to tell us something? Whatever that is, I'm willing to bet fracking had little or nothing to do with it.

[MadelineZapeezda]

Frackin’ here.....waiting for my royalty check! Well just started drilling

[muffaletaman]

In THIS case, they are not talking about using explosives (used to perforate steel casing with shaped charges in conventional drilling) but hydraulic fracturing of the rock.

Pump trucks are used to pump a slurry of water carrying a proppant (sand or other material) at high pressure into the oil/gas bearing rock formation. The pumping pressure is so high that it creates fractures in the rock. The water slurry carries the proppant deep into these formation cracks. Then the water is allowed to flow back to surface, where it is disposed of (or re-used). The proppant keeps the cracks open, and allows the oil and/or gas in the rock to be produced from the well.

They have been doing this fracking process since the late 1940’s - over 60 years. THIS part is nothing new really.

The new aspect to this process involves doing fracking in wells that are drilled horizontally to great lengths in the intended formation, instead of just being drilled vertically through the formation. This allows thousands of feet of the oil or gas-bearing formation to be accessed, instead of just a few feet.

The horizontal drilling techniques also allow multiple horizontal wells to be drilled from a single surface location, instead of using a new drilling location for each well.

http://www.propublica.org/special/hydraulic-fracturing-national

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_fracturing

http://www.halliburton.com/public/projects/pubsdata/hydraulic_fracturing/index.html

http://www.energyfromshale.org/shale-extraction-process?gclid=CLqo8OWehLMCFXGRPAod8wIAQQ

I work for none of the above, by the way, if it matters.

This technology can allow the US to be completely independent from oil from the middle east within a decade if we so desire.

[Balding_Eagle]

Here is an excellant video which shows how it’s done:

http://www.northernoil.com/drilling

[Balding_Eagle]

The video is an easy and concise way to convey to others just how fracking works, and how it protects gound water sources.

Pass along the link when ever you can.

http://www.northernoil.com/drilling

Unfortunately, I have no relationship with Northern Oil and Gas, nor any other oil drilling companies.

I am, however, a consumer of natural gas and gasoline, so I have a vested interest in the truth getting out.

[Myrddin]

The picture is a sinkhole in Bayou Corne, LA. A brine well used to store radiactive waste and diesel oil is disintegrating from below. There is methane incursion believed to be from the BP Macondo well that is working its way north and west under LA.

One of the links identifies earthquake locations and associates them with fields employing fracking. It's relevant as the Indo-Australian plate is breaking apart and putting pressure against the Pacific plate. That is putting pressure on volcanoes, mines and wells across the west coast of North America and northwest toward the Gulf of Mexico. That is exacerbating the problems in LA.

So why is fracking relevant? When you remove oil/gas from an area, there is a reduction of pressure and support below. The land subsides and you get sinkholes. In the case of Bayou Corne, the methane and salt water incursion is going to erode away the salt domes and push that erosion north. The end point of that looks to be right about Quebec.

The immediate concern at Bayou Corne is the heavy petroleum vapor in the air over the city and the probable disintegration of an adjacent cavern full of 1.5 million barrels of liquid butane.

[21twelve]

The earthquake in OK that was cited was at 3.6 miles deep IIRC. The fracking is done in a formation ranging in depths from 3000 to 5000 feet deep. No correlation, other than the fact that there are plenty of minor earthquakes and plenty of oil wells you can make matches like this.

As someone that enjoys the outdoors and “mother earth”, I am WAY more concerned about drilling and mining in countries that have NO consideration of the environment (China, Nigeria, Indosesia, etc.).

[Myrddin]

Have a peek at the links I posted. The problems are getting more serious daily. Very surprised that it isn't on the national news radar.

The Napoleonville Salt Dome at this link has drilling activity at 4,000 to 14,000 feet. That aside, it is disintegrating above and below the dome placing 500 billion cubic feet of gas, 200 million gallons of oil estimated in Napoleonville Salt Dome at risk as it seeps out.

[21twelve]

I did look at your links - where I got the info that the OK quake was at 3.1 miles (not 3.6 as I wrote earlier). More than three times deeper than the fracking wells.

The sinkhole in Louisiana does look like a bad deal. Seems it is related to a “brine company” mining activities there. Run water through the salt, gather the now salt water which is used in various processes. They left the now empty cavern and plugged the cavern up. That cavern has now collapsed and has worked its way to the surface.

The oil and gas is in the sedimentary rock around the salt formation - not in the salt. The salt had acted as a barrier. Now that it is gone the oil and gas is getting loose. But when they talk about the millions of gallons, etc. of oil - that is what is contained in the entire oil field around this salt dome - probably miles across (no - it doesn’t go all the way to Canada). And the oil and gas drilling has nothing to do with it. Heck - if anything, the drilling going on would reduce the amount of hydrocarbons in the ground that might make its way up to the surface.

It won’t be like millions of gallons of oil will be gushing out of this sinkhole. The risk to the nearby pipeline is a hazard, but it sounds like they have shut it down and it is now empty.

Yes an environmental problem, and accidents do happen, but one that they will be able to handle. And that they WILL handle. When stuff like this happens in Nigeria, China, etc. - they just let it flow as it is not worth it to fix the problem.

In China, more C02 is released from coal mine fires every year than all of the U.S. cars and trucks put out. (Not to mention China’s complete disregard for worker’s safety).

A good catch phrase for Environmentalists would be “Drill here, Drill now. And mining too”

[Myrddin]

Thus far the ability to "handle" the problem is less competent than Obama's first debate performance. The locals and local government are seething at the lack of competent intervention.