Oil well safety warning for fracking (BBC)
By James Morgan
Science reporter, BBC News
Plans to expand shale gas "fracking" in the UK must learn from leaks and poor monitoring at existing onshore oil and gas sites, scientists say.
A review of 2,152 wells drilled from 1902-2013 found up to 100 "orphaned" wells for which no firm is responsible.
Only two cases of well "failure" were recorded, but legacy sites are not monitored for leaks, the authors note.
The study led by ReFINE (Researching Fracking in Europe) is published in the journal Marine and Petroleum Geology.
It is perhaps the most comprehensive review yet of Britain's inland oil and gas legacy - pulling together scientific papers, government reports, and industry data.
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more: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-26692050
Ah, yes ... what happens when a well loses money, or a company goes out of business, leaving an orphan well to leak gas for years, or even decades ? Will ANY of the cleanup costs be borne by the companies that reaped the profits ? In the long run, this may turn out to be the biggest, worst consequence of the push for widespread fracking.
