North Carolinians could be forced to accept fracking on their property

By John Upton Donald Lee Pardue Forced fracking could be coming to Chatham County, N.C. Not willing to sell out to frackers? If you’re a property owner living above natural gas reserves in North Carolina, you might not have a choice. A panel charged by the state’s legislature with developing hydraulic fracturing guidelines recommended Wednesday that property owners be forced to allow drilling beneath their property if enough of their neighbors want it. From the Associated Press: A panel commissioned by state government said Wednesday that forced fracking should be allowed in North Carolina. Forced or compulsory pooling allows the state to let energy companies drill into natural gas reserves under non-consenting property owner’s land. Property owners in the state receive a percentage of the profits from gas extracted from under their property. The study group recommended at least 90 percent of acreage of a drilling area be voluntarily leased before remaining property owners are forcibly pooled. The News & Observer reports that the recommendation is expected to be adopted by the state legislature this fall. More from the article: The proposal by a state study group endorses a rarely used 1945 law that’s never been tried here on the kind of scale that would be required for shale gas exploration, or fracking. Thousands of property owners could potentially be affected in the state’s gas-rich midsection in Lee, Moore and Chatham counties. … “We are talking about a for-profit industry taking away personal freedoms with the blessing of the government,” Therese Vick, a community activist with the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, told the Compulsory Pooling Study Group. Taking away those personal freedoms is already the norm in some states. In Ohio, there’s an unofficial guideline stating that if 90 percent of property owners in an area consent to the sale of a gas deposit, everybody else has to sell out to frackers too, according to the Compulsory Pooling Study Group’s draft report [PDF]. In Kentucky, the figure is 51 percent. In Virginia, it’s just 25 percent. John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com. ============= Fracking boom could lead to housing bust By Roger Drouin thinkpanama When it comes to the real estate market in Bradford County, Pa., where 62,600 residents live above the Marcellus Shale, nothing is black and white, says Bob Benjamin, a local broker and certified appraiser. There aren’t exactly “fifty shades of grey,” he says, but residential mortgage lending here is an especially murky situation. When Benjamin fills out an appraisal for a lender, he has to note if there is a fracked well or an impoundment lake on or near the property. “I’m having to explain a lot of things when I give the appraisal to the lender,” he says. “They are asking questions about the well quite often.” And national lenders are becoming more cautious about underwriting mortgages for properties near fracking, even ones they would have routinely financed in the past, Benjamin says. That’s a real problem in Bradford County, where 93 percent of the acreage is now under lease to a gas company. Local banks are still lending because they have to if they want the business in the county, according to Benjamin, who has been involved in the area’s real estate market since 1980. But, he says, “The big boys, Wells Fargo and the other banks are probably pretty similar, they are going to protect their butt.” Lawyers, realtors, public officials, and environmental advocates from Pennsylvania to Arkansas to Colorado are noticing that banks and federal agencies are revisiting their lending policies to account for the potential impact of drilling on property values, and in some cases are refusing to finance property with or even just near drilling activity. Real estate experts say another problematic trend is that many homeowners insurance policies do not cover residential properties with a gas lease or gas well, yet all mortgage companies require homeowners insurance from their borrowers. “Well, that is a conflict,” says Greg May, vice president of residential mortgage lending at Ithaca, N.Y.-based Tompkins Trust Company. Last month, a landowner in Madison, N.Y., was surprised when their insurance company refused to renew their homeowners policy because there is a conventional gas well on their property. While the media and environmental groups have focused on shale drilling’s potential to poison the soil, water, and air, they’ve largely overlooked its potential to poison the real estate market. “I think we are on the tip of this,” says Steve Hvozdovich, Marcellus Shale coordinator for Clean Water Action in Pennsylvania. “Whether you are the homeowner trying to get homeowners insurance or the neighbor [to a fracking site] who is trying to refinance, there are just so many tentacles to this. I don’t think people are grasping all the impacts of natural gas drilling.” Benjamin doesn’t often hear property owners talk about the issue. “I don’t think most are concerned about it,” he says. “But I think they may have to be in the future.” The first denial Brian and Amy Smith live across the street from a new gas well in Daisytown in Washington County, Pa., an hour south of Pittsburgh. Last year, when they applied for a new mortgage on their $230,000 home and hobby farm, they were denied. According to ABC affiliate WTAE, this appears to be the first example in western Pennsylvania of a homeowner being denied a mortgage because of gas drilling on a neighbor’s property: In an email, Quicken Loans told the Smiths, “Unfortunately, we are unable to move forward with this loan. It is located across the street from a gas drilling site.” Two other national lenders also turned down Brian Smith’s application. “I think a lot of folks nationally are watching this case,” says Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.), a congressman who represents areas north and west of Denver. He noted that in his home district fracking leads to a “haircut on a property’s values.” “I think it is something that the banks would frankly be smart to look at,” Polis says. Elisabeth N. Radow, a lawyer and chair of the League of Women Voters of New York State’s Committee on Energy, Agriculture and the Environment, says the Smiths’ story shows that property owners are clearly vulnerable to what happens on their neighbors’ land in fracking territory. “A [fracking] gas well brings commercial activity, can pollute drinking water and devalue the property.” Radow says it’s logical that high-volume horizontal fracturing — an operation in which millions of gallons of water mixed with hundreds of chemicals are pumped horizontally into layers of shale — has lenders worried. “They are trying to protect themselves,” she says. Radow advises people looking to purchase a home anywhere with drilling to do their homework before buying. She predicts that homeowners will start seeing mortgage provisions prohibiting gas drilling. She saw one earlier this month from New Jersey, where the gas industry is lobbying Gov. Chris Christie (R) to open the Delaware River basin to fracking. The Obama administration has so far taken a hands-off approach to regulating fracking, as have many states, so the banks are trying to figure out how to proceed in uncertain territory. “What is the federal government doing to protect the Smiths of the world?” asks John R. Nolon, a land-use and property professor at Pace Law School. “Banks are out there on the frontier of this regulatory chaos saying, ‘We can’t assure ourselves this is a safe technology because there is this fragmented regulatory process.’” A very clear stance The “Mineral, Oil and Gas Rights Rider” [PDF] on loan paperwork from Sovereign Bank says the mortgage will be automatically recalled if the property owner transfers any oil or gas rights or allows any surface drilling activity. It also specifies that owners must “take affirmative steps to prevent the renewal or expansion” of a current gas lease. A spokesperson for Sovereign Bank said the company would not comment for this story. May, the lending firm vice president from Ithaca, says he is neither pro- nor anti-fracking, but he thinks property owners and prospective buyers need to be aware of these kinds of mortgage issues. “That is one of the top lenders that has taken a very clear stance,” May says of the Sovereign Bank document. “We need to pay attention to this.” Another big unknown is how homeowners might be affected by horizontal drilling happening underneath their property, May said. “Horizontal drill bores radiate out from the vertical bore up to one mile in each direction, which could potentially impact other owners’ fee-simple real estate ownership,” May says. The problems are here Twelve hundred miles southwest of Bradford County, Connee Robertson and her husband run an animal rescue center on 1.6 acres overlooking Little Red River in Heber Springs, Ark. Robertson moved to the area in 1993 because she fell in love with this part of the Ozarks known for its pristine rivers and lakes. That was before gas companies such as Chesapeake Energy discovered the Fayetteville shale formation in the early 2000s. Once that happened, the majority of property owners in Heber Springs leased their gas rights. “Everyone saw dollar signs,” Robertson says. “Everyone ends up regretting it. The problems are here now.” Over the past few years, those problems have included earthquakes and drilling crews pulling water out of the Little Red River. One of Robertson’s horses died for unknown reasons, and her neighbors’ wells have been polluted. More recently, Robertson has heard about buyers unable to purchase homes in the area because they can’t secure financing. In the Laurel Highlands area of Pennsylvania’s Allegheny Mountains, traditionally known for tourism and recreation, drilling is scaring off prospective second-home buyers before they even start thinking about mortgages, says Melissa Troutman of the Mountain Watershed Association. She knows of one buyer who left the market after they learned that there was drilling three and a half miles from a home they were looking at. In technical default Many of the largest mortgage institutions have already enacted policies that bar lending to certain properties near gas drilling and gas lines. The Federal Housing Administration’s lending guidelines prohibit financing for homes within 300 feet of a property with “an active or planned drilling site.” In an email response to a question from Grist, FHA spokesman Lemar Wooley explained the reasoning behind the guidelines: FHA is primarily concerned with the health and safety of the occupants of the dwelling. If the property is subject to smoke, fumes, offensive noise and odors, etc. to the extent they would endanger the health of the occupants then the property is ineligible. FHA is also concerned with the risk to the insurance fund. So if the property is subject to those same items and the health of the occupants is not endangered, but the marketability of the property is compromised, the property may not be eligible for FHA insurance. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac also prohibit property owners from signing a gas lease. May said many owners are now in “technical default” under the terms of their mortgage if they signed a gas lease without first getting consent from their lender. Another clause in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgages prohibits hazardous materials on a residential property. “It comes as a surprise to a lot of people. They weren’t aware that their mortgage came with those restrictions,” May said. Back in Bradford County, Benjamin, who plans to retire in 10 or so years, hasn’t decided whether he wants to keep his family in the area, where there are “good and bad points” to the drilling boom. But he knows one thing for sure: Fracking “changed everything” in the region’s real estate market. Roger Drouin is a freelance journalist who covers environmental issues. When he’s not reporting or writing, he is out getting almost lost in the woods. He blogs at rogersoutdoorblog.com. =======================

BP to export U.S. crude to Canada, Shell seeks permit

Thu, Oct 11 20:01 PM EDT By David Sheppard and Chris Baltimore NEW YORK/HOUSTON (Reuters) - Oil major BP Plc has secured U.S. government permission to ship U.S. crude oil to Canada, and Royal Dutch Shell has applied for an export license, as rising production in the world's top oil consumer upends global energy flows. A surge in output from shale oil reserves in the Bakken of North Dakota and Eagle Ford of Texas has raised U.S. domestic production to the highest level since 1995. While the United States still imports more than 8 million barrels of crude oil per day, a glut of light, sweet crude oil created by the controversial hydraulic boom could fetch higher prices on international markets. This summer BP Plc received a license to export crude oil to specific Canadian refineries from the Bureau of Industry and Security, a branch of the US Commerce Department, a source familiar with the issue said on Thursday. BP has yet to export any crude oil on that license, the source said. Shell spokeswoman Kayla Macke told Reuters they have also now applied for a license, but would not comment on likely export destinations or the volumes of crude involved. "We have applied to the Department of Commerce to export domestic U.S. crude oil," Macke said, adding that as a global commodity, imports and exports would follow supply and demand. A nearly century-old U.S. law requires companies to get a special license to export crude oil. Until recently, there has been little or no demand for overseas shipments, apart from a trickle of crude from Alaska that has been routinely exported. So far, the export business appears geared toward sending supplies of light, sweet Bakken crude from North Dakota to a clutch of Canadian refiners on the East Coast, which are otherwise dependent on costlier European imports. Those refiners in turn export much of their refined fuel to the United States. Pipeline bottlenecks have pushed prices in the U.S. Midwest to more than $20 below international marker Brent crude, which traded above $115 a barrel on Thursday. Many experts are now watching for signs that companies are pressing for a much more controversial move than shipping oil to Canada: permission to ship crude overseas from the Gulf Coast, allowing traders to sell American oil to importers as far afield as Argentina. BOOMING SUPPLIES The Financial Times first reported the news, saying Swiss-based trading firm Vitol had also applied for a license, citing people familiar with the matter. "Other than routine movement between Canada and the United States, we have not been involved in any crude oil export requests," a Vitol spokesman told Reuters, adding they had been shipping crude to Canada for some time. U.S. oil production has become a fiercely contested issue in the Presidential election race, with gasoline and diesel prices near $4 a gallon. Republican nominee Mitt Romney has promised North American energy independence by 2020 by supporting fracking and opening up parts of the Atlantic Coast for drilling. President Barack Obama wants to cut U.S. oil imports in half over the same time period while promoting an "all-of-the-above" policy that backs renewable energy alongside increased U.S. production of fossil fuels. Government data shows U.S. domestic crude oil production hit 6.6 million barrels per day last week, the highest level since May 1995 due to the rise in fracking. But domestic U.S. refiners, especially on the Gulf Coast, have been upgraded to process cheaper, heavier types of crude from Mexico or Saudi Arabia, and are often ill-suited for refining the lighter crudes from fracking. PRESUMPTION OF APPROVAL By law, the Department of Commerce cannot confirm or deny whether it has received license applications or granted licenses, but companies have been exporting crude oil for several decades. Exports to Canada have a "presumption of approval," a Commerce spokesperson said in an email. U.S. crude oil exports to Canada have been growing slowly and steadily. Shipments reached 77,000 barrels per day (bpd) in July, the second-highest volume on record, according to U.S. government data. It was not clear whether the data also counted crude that was re-imported. Exports to Canada are double what they were five years ago, but are still a tiny drop next to 8 to 9 million barrels the U.S. imports each day, including 3 million bpd from its northern neighbor. Lacking pipeline access to Alberta's oil sands, Canadian refineries in Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Newfoundland are dependent on foreign crude. According to the most recent figures from Canada's National Energy Board, Canada imported almost 650,000 barrels per day in May, 23 percent higher than the prior month but down 5.3 percent from May 2012. While most of the imports come from overseas, U.S. crude can be exported to Canada by rail, barge or pipeline. Indeed, Enbridge Inc's massive Lakehead pipeline system can take Bakken crude to the refining hub at Sarnia, Ontario, while the 300,000 bpd Irving Oil refiner at Saint John, New Brunswick, is taking railcars of Bakken crude to replace more-expensive seaborne supplies. Canadian imports of Bakken crude could rise when Enbridge completes its Eastern Access project that will expand the capacity of its system to handle rising production from North Dakota and the oil sands and reverse an existing pipeline to bring Western crude as far east as Montreal. "I believe the assumption that the Commerce Department works on is that crude oil shipped to Canada comes back to the U.S. as product. It equals out more or less," said Lucian Pugliaresi, president of the Energy Policy Research Foundation in Washington DC. "The working assumption is that if you were to submit an application for a waterbourne export to Brazil or somewhere else, then Commerce might treat that much different." (Additional reporting by Jonathan Leff in New York, Timothy Gardner, Roberta Rampton and Ayesha Rascoe in Washington and Scott Haggett in Calgary; Editing by Bernard Orr)

UPDATE 4-Schlumberger sees hit from fracking price pressures

Mon, Mar 26 15:23 PM EDT

* N.America liquids basins start seeing price pressure in Q1

* Schlumberger shares down 1.2 pct, Baker Hughes off 1.6 pct

* Market leader Halliburton rises, seen as better placed

By Braden Reddall

NEW ORLEANS, March 26 (Reuters) - Schlumberger Ltd, the world's largest oilfield services company, said profits would be hurt by downward pricing pressure for hydraulic fracturing services, which had now reached North American liquids-producing basins as well.

Chief Executive Paal Kibsgaard said that on top of the price squeeze, already widely seen in natural gas areas due to weak gas prices, the shift of pressure pumping equipment to liquids-rich basins was reducing utilization while also adding to costs.

"Together these factors will have an impact on our results both in North America, and overall, in this and in the coming quarters,"

Kibsgaard said in a speech to kick off the Howard Weil Energy Conference in New Orleans on Monday.

The use of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, around the many U.S. shale basins has boosted natural gas production while stemming (To make headway against: )a decades-long trend of falling U.S. oil production.

"There is some slackening of demand in the gas plays and there has been migration to liquids plays. So there's more supply coming online and it is normal that pricing would come down," said David Vaucher, an analyst with IHS-Cambridge Energy Research Associates in Houston.
Vaucher highlighted the challenge of getting all those materials to so many wells. "Looking at just pressure pumping is a little myopic," he said. "There is upward pressure for all other things that are still required for fracking jobs."


But other supplies remain scarce in general, from rigs to frack crews, water, sand and synthetic proppants used to keep cracks in shale rock open to get the hydrocarbons out.



HALLIBURTON UP

Shares of Schlumberger, which makes most of its money outside North America, fell 1.2 percent to $72.28, while rival Baker Hughes Inc dropped 1.6 percent to $43.03.

Baker Hughes gave a profit warning last week, in addition to a warning in January, about the impact of disruptions from its fracking crew relocations and supply shortages.

But shares of Halliburton, the market leader in North American pressure pumping, rose 0.8 percent on Monday.

"We believe (Halliburton) has a much better developed supply-chain network, and while not immune to near-term frictions, will likely post much better margins than its peers in North America," Sterne Agee Analyst Stephen Gengaro wrote on Monday as he cut profit estimates for Baker Hughes.

Nabors Industries Ltd, the No. 6 in North American pressure pumping, sees an increasingly competitive market in 2012 and a U.S. land rig count "flat to slightly down" in the second half of 2012. But the company said that with 72 percent of its 2012 operating income under contract, the downside was limited.

Nabors also spelled out plans to sell its helicopter business and well service rigs in Canada, some of its offshore rigs, as well as its oil and gas properties. Dahlman Rose's James Crandell expects those sales to raise about $1 billion.

Outside North America, Schlumberger saw steady growth from deepwater activity and exploration, as well as key land markets.

"The medium-term outlook for the oil and gas industry remains positive, driven by the narrow cushion of spare oil capacity and the growing demand for natural gas," Kibsgaard said in his first presentation to the conference after taking over as CEO from Andrew Gould last August.

Barclays believes international growth could offset the near-term weakness in North America. "We think this softness is largely due to transitory issues and some pricing pressure in pressure pumping," analysts at the bank wrote on Monday.

Bernard Duroc-Danner, an economics Ph.D. who runs oilfield services company Weatherford International Ltd , said the pressure pumping market may get even tougher as a result of building decisions made three months ago in response to what were then healthy margins.

"Beyond the 'gas very bad, oil very very good' phenomenon, pressure pumping has dynamics of its own insofar as there is a quite sizeable amount of capacity just waiting to come on the market," Duroc-Danner told the conference.

The industry has attempted to rein in this expansion. Superior Energy Services Inc, for one, cut its pressure pumping capacity growth plan this year by about one-quarter.

This follows the huge ramp-up in the past few years. Dan Pickering, of Tudor, Pickering, Holt, sees available hydraulic horsepower by year-end at 19 million horsepower, or 2-1/2 times more than in 2009. A typical frack job uses up about 50,000 hp. === Jul. 22, 2012 6:44 PM ET Experts: Some fracking critics use bad science By KEVIN BEGOS, Associated Press AIM Share FILE - In this file photo from Nov. 3, 2010, documentary filmmaker Josh Fox speaks at a rally of protestors against Marcellus Shale drilling and hydraulic fracturing in Pittsburgh. Researchers say the claim that fracking has been linked to increased cancer rates in Texas is simply wrong. Fox, an Oscar-nominated filmmaker who uses the claim in a new film, declined to acknowledge the error when told of researchers who say he's doing a disservice to people with cancer by misrepresenting health data. (AP Photo/Keith Srakocic, File) More News Video APNewsBreak: EPA reviews part of power plant rule Jul. 20, 20125:32 PM ET Judge slaps mining company with $2 million penalty Jul. 20, 20123:44 PM ET NM fuel spill threatens Albuquerque water supply Jul. 20, 20126:31 AM ET US insurer won't cover gas drill fracking exposure Jul. 12, 201210:12 PM ET Electric rates not falling along with fuel costs Jul. 11, 20122:54 PM ET PITTSBURGH (AP) — In the debate over natural gas drilling, the companies are often the ones accused of twisting the facts. But scientists say opponents sometimes mislead the public, too. Critics of fracking often raise alarms about groundwater pollution, air pollution, and cancer risks, and there are still many uncertainties. But some of the claims have little — or nothing— to back them. For example, reports that breast cancer rates rose in a region with heavy gas drilling are false, researchers told The Associated Press. Fears that natural radioactivity in drilling waste could contaminate drinking water aren't being confirmed by monitoring, either. And concerns about air pollution from the industry often don't acknowledge that natural gas is a far cleaner burning fuel than coal. "The debate is becoming very emotional. And basically not using science" on either side, said Avner Vengosh, a Duke University professor studying groundwater contamination who has been praised and criticized by both sides. Shale gas drilling has attracted national attention because advances in technology have unlocked billions of dollars of gas reserves, leading to a boom in production, jobs, and profits, as well as concerns about pollution and public health. Shale is a gas-rich rock formation thousands of feet underground, and the gas is freed through a process called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in which large volumes of water, plus sand and chemicals, are injected to break the rock apart. The Marcellus Shale covers large parts of Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio and West Virginia, while the Barnett Shale is in north Texas. Many other shale deposits have been discovered. One of the clearest examples of a misleading claim comes from north Texas, where gas drilling began in the Barnett Shale about 10 years ago. Opponents of fracking say breast cancer rates have spiked exactly where intensive drilling is taking place — and nowhere else in the state. The claim is used in a letter that was sent to New York's Gov. Andrew Cuomo by environmental groups and by Josh Fox, the Oscar-nominated director of "Gasland," a film that criticizes the industry. Fox, who lives in Brooklyn, has a new short film called "The Sky is Pink." But researchers haven't seen a spike in breast cancer rates in the area, said Simon Craddock Lee, a professor of medical anthropology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. David Risser, an epidemiologist with the Texas Cancer Registry, said in an email that researchers checked state health data and found no evidence of an increase in the counties where the spike supposedly occurred. And Susan G. Komen for the Cure, a major cancer advocacy group based in Dallas, said it sees no evidence of a spike, either. "We don't," said Chandini Portteus, Komen's vice president of research, adding that they sympathize with people's fears and concerns, but "what we do know is a little bit, and what we don't know is a lot" about breast cancer and the environment. Yet Fox tells viewers in an ominous voice that "In Texas, as throughout the United States, cancer rates fell — except in one place— in the Barnett Shale." Lee called the claims of an increase "a classic case of the ecological fallacy" because they falsely suggest that breast cancer is linked to just one factor. In fact, diet, lifestyle and access to health care also play key roles. Fox responded to questions by citing a press release from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that doesn't support his claim, and a newspaper story that Risser said is "not based on a careful statistical analysis of the data." When Fox was told that Texas cancer researchers said rates didn't increase, he replied in an email that the claim of unusually high breast cancer rates was "widely reported" and said there is "more than enough evidence to warrant much deeper study." Another instance where fears haven't been confirmed by science is the concern that radioactivity in drilling fluids could threaten drinking water supplies. Critics of fracking note the deep underground water that comes up along with gas has high levels of natural radioactivity. Since much of that water, called flowback, was once being discharged into municipal sewage treatment plants and then rivers in Pennsylvania, there was concern about public water supplies. But in western Pennsylvania, the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority did extensive tests and didn't find a problem in area rivers. State environmental officials said monitoring at public water supply intakes across the state showed non-detectable levels of radiation, and the two cases that showed anything were at background levels. Concerns about the potential problem also led to regulatory changes. An analysis by The Associated Press of data from Pennsylvania found that of the 10.1 million barrels of shale wastewater generated in the last half of 2011, about 97 percent was either recycled, sent to deep-injection wells, or sent to a treatment plant that doesn't discharge into waterways. Critics of fracking also repeat claims of extreme air pollution threats, even as evidence mounts that the natural gas boom is in some ways contributing to cleaner air. Marcellus air pollution "will cause a massive public health crisis," claims a section of the Marcellus Shale Protest website. Yet data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration show that the shale gas boom is helping to turn many large power plants away from coal, which emits far more pollution. And the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency passed new rules to force drillers to limit releases of methane from wells and pumping stations. Some environmental groups now say that natural gas is having a positive effect on air quality. Earlier this year, the group PennFuture said gas is a much cleaner burning fuel, and it called gas-fired power plants "orders of magnitude cleaner" than coal plants. Marcellus Shale Protest said in response to a question about its claims that "any possible benefit in electric generation must be weighed against the direct harm from the industrial processes of gas extraction." One expert said there's an actual psychological process at work that sometimes blinds people to science, on the fracking debate and many others. "You can literally put facts in front of people, and they will just ignore them," said Mark Lubell, the director of the Center for Environmental Policy and Behavior at the University of California, Davis. Lubell said the situation, which happens on both sides of a debate, is called "motivated reasoning." Rational people insist on believing things that aren't true, in part because of feedback from other people who share their views, he said. Vengosh noted the problem of spinning science isn't new, or limited to one side in the gas drilling controversy. For example, industry supporters have claimed that drilling never pollutes water wells, when state regulators have confirmed cases where it has. He says the key point is that science is slow, and research into gas drilling's many possible effects are in the early stages, and much more work remains to be done. "Everyone takes what they want to see," Vengosh said, adding that he hopes that the fracking debate will become more civilized as scientists obtain more hard data. Associated Press ============