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One emerging threat to the pristine environment of the Finger Lakes region is the drilling of deep wells to extract natural gas from the Marcellus Shale.
When drilling for natural gas, energy companies use a process known as "hydraulic fracturing" to inject chemicals into the ground in order to break-up sand and rock formations. By breaking up sand and rock, they can more easily extract oil and gas from the ground. Over the productive life of of the well, it may be fractured every 12 months or so.
The problem is that the chemicals used during hydraulic fracturing may be toxic to humans. Efforts by several environmental advocacy organizations to obtain chemical compositions of hydraulic fracturing fluids have not been successful. Oil and gas companies will not reveal what they say is proprietary information and the government doesn’t require them to do so.
Very small quantities of toxic chemicals are capable of contaminating millions of gallons of water. Only a few tablespoons of some chemicals could contaminate millions of gallons of ground water at concentrations that would render it undrinkable. Although much of the injected fracturing fluids are pumped out of the ground, 20% to 30% of the fluids may remain in the ground. It is unclear how contaminated water brought to the surface will be handled and treated.