Fracking America

Description

Fracking America, by Dr. Walter M. Brasch, is a comprehensive and well-documented look at the impacts of a controversial process to extract gas and oil from more than a mile below the earth’s surface. It is a cross-over book that meets the demanding standards of academic scholarship, while also being easily readable by the general population. Among the chapters are those that focus upon the economic, political, health, and environmental impacts of fracking. The book also includes chapters about the history of oil/gas extraction, psychological and sociological effects upon those living in the shale areas, worker safety issues, effects upon agriculture and livestock, problems with fossil fuel transportation, theological perspectives about fracking and the environment, the anti-fracking movement, how the media cover the fracking industry and how the industry and those opposed to fracking use the media, and renewable energy. He also looks at colleges that allow fracking on their campuses and which also conduct, often for questionable motives and with grant money from the industry, research into fracking that reflects industry talking points. Fracking America presents complicated issues in an easy-to-understand fashion, while also humanizing the problems. Dr. Brasch interviewed more than 300 persons--including health and environmental professionals and citizen-activists, those who work in the industry, government officials, and those directly affected by the fracking process--in his research for the book. The book also reveals the often secret connections between politicians and the industry. It is this connection that has led to exaggerated claims about economic benefits, while disregarding health and environmental problems. The long-term benefits that politicians and the industry claim are nothing less than hype, says the author who had predicted the “boom” to “bubble” to “bust” in fracking long before it has become economically difficult for many oil and gas extraction corporations to survive.

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