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EPA Weighs National Fracking Disclosure Regulations

Pennsylvania is one of seven states requiring natural gas drillers to disclose what chemicals they’re using during hydraulic fracturing operations. According to Bloomberg News, the Environmental Protection Agency is considering making those standards national:

The Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday that it would weigh rules requiring disclosure of the chemicals used in hydraulic-fracturing fluids.
Companies such as Halliburton Co. and Schlumberger Ltd., which supply oil and natural gas producers, should be required to reveal substances used in the mining technology known as fracking, according to a petition filed with the EPA by the environmental group Earthjustice. In a response posted on its website Wednesday, the EPA said it would begin gathering data.
The EPA will try to provide “aggregate pictures of the chemical substances and mixtures used in hydraulic fracturing,” Stephen A. Owens, an assistant administrator at the agency, said in a letter to Deborah Goldberg, an attorney for Earthjustice. “This would not duplicate, but instead complement, the well-by-well disclosure programs of states.”

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