Hydraulic Fracturing Report

Introduction Hydraulic fracturing, having been patented in 1949 has been the caveat by which one third of the natural gas in the U.S. is obtained.1 The fracturing process requires millions of gallons of fluid to be driven into the ground at high enough pressures to break up shale and rock and in turn lets out natural gases. The process has been proven to be very successful thus being one of the major contributors to modern day natural gas collecting. Though there are many great aspects to hydraulic fracturing, concerns do arise. What is in this fracturing fluid? Is there ground water being contaminated with rocks and the unknown fluid during this process? The hydraulic fluid is known to contain a variety of additives such as dilute acids,

The pH of the water can have a great impact on aquatic life and the ecosystem if it has sudden shifts. The pH was first checked with the pH paper resulting with an average of three trials resulting in a 7.1 reading. Next the pH was read with the pH meter, the result of the three trials yielded an average of 8.31 and the pH on the day of collection was 7.12. The 7.1 reading of the pH paper fell more closely to the sample day pH, with a range of 0.4. On the other hand the pH meter recorded the pH with a range of only .05 which is much closer and the 8.31 average more closely relates to previous data on the Chip-A-Waters River. The day of the sample selection there was rain that could have had acidity that made the sample day water more acidic than usual, and the pH paper readings could have been in error due to old pH paper and limitation of available reading range and significant figures. Though on the pH meter there was a found uncertainty of .19. When the buffer 7.0 pH solution was tested with the meter it read at a 7.19 pH. Both readings though vastly different fall between the normal range of 5.5-8.5

The alkalinity was tested through the use of mini titrations. After the three mini tirations it was deduced that the average alkalinity was 240 mg/L CaCO3. This value falling on the high end, but still in the average of 20-250 mg/L CaCO3. The high alkalinity makes sense of why there was a difference in the sample day to the experimental day. Because of the high alkalinity and the water having time to sit, it would have had time to reach equilibrium resulting in a more basic pH. The data did have large room for error due to the fact that the mini titrations were done using a dropper and that every drop was then multiplied by 17.1 to find the alkalinity value. Additional error could have occured in incomplete pouring of the Green-Methyl Red Indicator Powder