It is easy for the petroleum industry to point at its fracking fluid as a means of distraction from the ENTIRE problem. I am quite confident the petroleum industry will pander to the EPA and attempt to change the content of the fracking fluid to satisfy the legitimate dangers these chemicals cause to human health, but, that fracking fluid alone is not the problem. The fracking operation and its products and by-products are as much the problem.
The fracking fluid is only the beginning of the problem. When the fracking fluid enters the ground and contaminates ground water and aquifers it also is melting rock and soil. The COMPONENTS of the MELTED rock and soils also become fluid and enter the ground water, too.
Then the fracking operation reaches the methane there is a rush of the gas to the surface. Methane will travel as a gas along the path of least resistance. The methane released from hydraulic fracturing (fracking) is under pressure and it is a lot of pressure. The land above the methane is over a mile and a half deep, that provides a lot of pressure to force the gas out of the deep earth chamber where it was contained. So what occurs is what is noted in this video. As a flow of methane is released through an open garden hose the volume of the methane increases as time goes by because the path of least resistance is under growing pressure from previously blocked routes.
The man in this video states at the end he can't even put the flame out. That is due to the ever increasing volume of methane finding its path out of containment. If he let this burning go on long enough the flame would increase until it reached its capacity to discharge at the end of the garden hose. Then the garden hose would explode either under pressure due to the increased volume of methane it contained or becaue the volume of gas would become so great it would then be inside the hose opening of the hose itself melting the metal and the hose and causing failure of the integrity of the garden hose. As far as I am concerned this gentleman was lucky the ignited methane didn't travel back into the hose and into the well head to really cause some damage to both he, his land and his home and all those he loves in it.
