Issues With Hydraulic Fracturing Exposed In The Film Of Josh Fox

Water is essential to life on this planet; the human race strives to obtain and protect it. With established environmental laws such as the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act. Along with the most essential ingredient to sustaining life, man has also been in search of energy. From fire, to horse power, coal, and now natural gas, growing populations have sought out ways to harness energy and use it to better their lives. Society has run into many problems between depletion and unsafe practices in regards to harnessing energy. As infrastructures advance so do their practices and needs to sustain life. What happens when both of these intersect and not in a positive way? What happens when coal is no longer a highly sought after resource, and the newest, cheapest way also comes with a pricetag on the environment? What happens when those in charge ignore danger signs and the resulting high cost of health in nature? Josh Fox explores these issues in his documentary Gasland, but will the audience see the whole picture?

While watching the documentary Gasland, Josh Fox received an unplanned offer of $100,000 for the natural gas drilling rights to his property in the Delaware River Basin, on the border of New York and Pennsylvania. Fox actually resisted the quick urge to accept. Instead, he set off on a cross-country journey to investigate the environmental risks of agreeing to the deal. Individuals still do not have the proper information about fracturing. People are unfazed and even unaware of the potential dangers of hydraulic fracturing, it seems sometimes. While state and local environmental agencies do not have the resources to fully investigate or regulate the gas industry we must show concern for the cause and do our parts in this epidemic. Josh explores the motives that individuals have and he forces people to look deep within themselves. He does this to reveal the true within everyone to see how far they will go to make some money.

He decided to go out and interview people that are being affected by the hydraulic fracking. There are thousands of sites in Colorado, Texas, and Wyoming, and many other states while the company continues to expand their sites to even more states. The company used harmful chemicals that was polluting many peoples water, and most of the time if you lit the water on fire, it wouldn’t go out like if it was normal water, it would go up in flames for a short while indicating the water wasn’t just water. It had natural gases in it, causing it to light up in flames, which obviously isn’t safe for human to drink. Most people were afraid to stand up for themselves. Some would go into town and buy gallons of water so they didn’t have to drink the contaminated water.

Those who did drink the contaminated water, some not knowing it was contaminated in the first place, got extremely ill, some even cancer. Some got extremely weak and couldn’t get around how they used to. People and animals were losing hair and some animals were dying. Everyone who drank the water would get some type of sickness and when people tried to confront the company of the issue, the company would say they have no proof that hydraulic fracking caused their water to go bad, even when the water got bad right after the fracking started. The company was asked to drink the water that was sampled by Fox of every person he interviewed and they declined. In the end, there was a lawsuit that didn’t change anything. Since no one had any proof, nothing could be done. Although, this documentary was made in 2010, which was eight years ago, so something could have been done about the issue.

Josh has confidence in himself and his cause and I commend him for that and for looking into the subject to obtain the truth that he desires. This film evokes so much emotion in many, including myself, which I am astonished at what we really do not know and how harmful it is to the many that are in these effected areas of fracturing. This is a great film and it cannot be easily be duplicated and I am glad that I had the chance to watch it and learn about the important matters at hand. This film also uncovers how morally corrupt humans can be and let this happen without doing proper research into it and how it affects them or those around them. The people wanting this to happen and taking part in this would be subject to prosecution and jail time. The earth is irreplaceable and in short supply of many resources and to have them knowingly destruct the earth and it resources is so wrong in so many ways that it is a disgrace.

The one critique I have of this film is I feel like it lacks a bit of research, Research is conflicting on both sides, with continuous finger pointing. The audience has seen the wells lead to flammable and hazardous water. Yet Fox lacks researching or addressing the possible cleaner fracking techniques. What was being done in the 40s that is not being done now? Is there another energy resource he would rather advocate or does he support natural gas just not the process in which it is obtained? What about renewable energy resources? Since both of his films came out, there have been a number of movements against fracking. The state of Nevada recently developed their own regulation to ban fracking due to numerous reports of adverse health effects (Snyder). While Fox’s message is admirable, it would likely do more good to address possible remedies and not just light the match of fear to start a forest fire of anti-natural gas. With that being said the lack of research are most like down to the fact that Fox lacks the resources. Unlike the three documentaries that were assigned to class, Fox is not a multi-millionaire socialite. This was an independent project, and that is evident in the video quality.

Once again, this movie was a great one that helps shed light on the many subjects that we are not aware of. Josh Fox does a wonderful job at highlighting the lack of knowledge many have on hydraulic fracturing and how many disregard the lives and livelihood of others, in order to benefit themselves and make a little bit of money.