Clive G
Member
I've been interested to read the posts about fracking elsewhere in the forum and, indeed, this subject has ultimately been sufficient to persuade me to re-enter all my log-in details for the forum, which the automatic software generously deleted a while back - in spite of leaving my old messages behind!
Has anyone seen the following video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y08FyEFfIY
It's about the Dowra No. 2 fracking site near Owenmore River, Gubb, Glangelvin, Co. Cavan, Ireland. According to 'The Underground Atlas' by Middleton & Waltham: "Within the counties of Sligo, Leitrim and Cavan are some fine limestone plateaux, though the best caves are across the border in Fermanagh." (p.108)
Well, I went caving in Co. Fermanagh back in 1983 with Mark Campbell (and was looked at aghast afterwards by his mother for driving solo in a new English-registered Vauxhall Astra through Belfast, to her home along the Cregagh Road!), but don't know much about Co. Cavan. I don't know whether the white stuff has been analysed properly in a laboratory, but, according to the YouTube page, the fracking chemicals used are supposed to have consisted of: "fresh water, 15% HCl, Nitrogen Foam (Fracturing Fluid), Guar Gellant, Foam Surfacant, Breaker E Enzyme Breaker and X-cide 207 Bactericide."
If you have a copy of 'Limestones and caves of Wales', you'll find a mention of some geological prospecting in the chapter on 'The Mynydd Llangattwg Cave Systems', that I co-authored with Pete Smart: ". . . a borehole drilled at Pen-ffordd-goch (SO 2553 1058), near Keeper's Pond and not far from the summit of the Blorenge, intersected a 4 m void with 2 m of sand on the floor at a depth of 120 m." (p.124) That was written eight years before Ogof Draenen was found, but did cavers ever find the data logger, which was lost down the borehole into an open cave passage? There was some concern expressed following the discovery of cave passages beneath the Blorenge, in Ogof Draenen, that there may have been some degree of radioactivity connected with the logger.
In January 1984 I was trapped in Agen Allwedd, along with Martyn Farr and John Cooper, due to extreme flooding in the cave. When we approached Turkey Streamway from Summertime we not only heard a loud din, before we got to the stream passage, but we also smelt very strong diesel fumes, too. Then, when we actually arrived at the flooded river passage, we saw milky white water, which was discoloured by fine, ground-limestone powder. The smell and the disolouration of the water, during high-water conditions underground, both ceased after New Blaen Onneu Quarry was closed.
So, my question to the fracking experts is: how is drilling a hole in the ground and then pressurising up all the cracks and fissures down the hole going to take place in limestone country without polluting and poisoning whatever cave systems and associated biologically sensitive eco systems (including bat hibernation sites, etc.) are situated above the fracking zone? Is there actually any control whatsoever over how far and wide the fracking chemicals leach out underground, before finding faults and fissures through which to return to the surface, or to open cavities within the strata above?
Does the pollution witnessed in Ireland, in limestone country, not require proper investigation first - to find out what the white substance is and how it has reached the surface river - before more boreholes are sunk and chemicals introduced in other limestone regions? We're looking at problems arising here 11 years after the exploratory fracking . . .
And chalk is not a lot different from limestone, because "quite extensive cave systems caves can be found in the chalk" - eg. Eastbourne, etc.: http://www.kurg.org.uk/sites/natural_caves.htm
I was amused by Robin Griffith's reference in http://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?topic=15228.msg201228#msg201228 to James Bond:
Once the salt water had been pumped, it was an explosive detonation in a large subterranean cavern, near a key geological weakness, that was supposed to start off the annihilation of Silicon Valley - but May Day (Grace Jones) saved the day by riding the truck carrying the detonator out of the mine!
So, on the basis of the anticipated 'minor tremors', once fracking begins, I'll add my own reference to the ending of another film, the rather entertaining Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood musical, 'Paint Your Wagon' (1969) . . . The theory was that the gold-bearing land had all been accounted for, so the ingenious ones would 'clean up' instead on the 'marginals', by driving tunnels beneath all the saloons where gold dust had been spilled beneath the boards . . .
Has anyone seen the following video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y08FyEFfIY
It's about the Dowra No. 2 fracking site near Owenmore River, Gubb, Glangelvin, Co. Cavan, Ireland. According to 'The Underground Atlas' by Middleton & Waltham: "Within the counties of Sligo, Leitrim and Cavan are some fine limestone plateaux, though the best caves are across the border in Fermanagh." (p.108)
Well, I went caving in Co. Fermanagh back in 1983 with Mark Campbell (and was looked at aghast afterwards by his mother for driving solo in a new English-registered Vauxhall Astra through Belfast, to her home along the Cregagh Road!), but don't know much about Co. Cavan. I don't know whether the white stuff has been analysed properly in a laboratory, but, according to the YouTube page, the fracking chemicals used are supposed to have consisted of: "fresh water, 15% HCl, Nitrogen Foam (Fracturing Fluid), Guar Gellant, Foam Surfacant, Breaker E Enzyme Breaker and X-cide 207 Bactericide."
If you have a copy of 'Limestones and caves of Wales', you'll find a mention of some geological prospecting in the chapter on 'The Mynydd Llangattwg Cave Systems', that I co-authored with Pete Smart: ". . . a borehole drilled at Pen-ffordd-goch (SO 2553 1058), near Keeper's Pond and not far from the summit of the Blorenge, intersected a 4 m void with 2 m of sand on the floor at a depth of 120 m." (p.124) That was written eight years before Ogof Draenen was found, but did cavers ever find the data logger, which was lost down the borehole into an open cave passage? There was some concern expressed following the discovery of cave passages beneath the Blorenge, in Ogof Draenen, that there may have been some degree of radioactivity connected with the logger.
In January 1984 I was trapped in Agen Allwedd, along with Martyn Farr and John Cooper, due to extreme flooding in the cave. When we approached Turkey Streamway from Summertime we not only heard a loud din, before we got to the stream passage, but we also smelt very strong diesel fumes, too. Then, when we actually arrived at the flooded river passage, we saw milky white water, which was discoloured by fine, ground-limestone powder. The smell and the disolouration of the water, during high-water conditions underground, both ceased after New Blaen Onneu Quarry was closed.
So, my question to the fracking experts is: how is drilling a hole in the ground and then pressurising up all the cracks and fissures down the hole going to take place in limestone country without polluting and poisoning whatever cave systems and associated biologically sensitive eco systems (including bat hibernation sites, etc.) are situated above the fracking zone? Is there actually any control whatsoever over how far and wide the fracking chemicals leach out underground, before finding faults and fissures through which to return to the surface, or to open cavities within the strata above?
Does the pollution witnessed in Ireland, in limestone country, not require proper investigation first - to find out what the white substance is and how it has reached the surface river - before more boreholes are sunk and chemicals introduced in other limestone regions? We're looking at problems arising here 11 years after the exploratory fracking . . .
And chalk is not a lot different from limestone, because "quite extensive cave systems caves can be found in the chalk" - eg. Eastbourne, etc.: http://www.kurg.org.uk/sites/natural_caves.htm
I was amused by Robin Griffith's reference in http://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?topic=15228.msg201228#msg201228 to James Bond:
RobinGriffiths said:
Once the salt water had been pumped, it was an explosive detonation in a large subterranean cavern, near a key geological weakness, that was supposed to start off the annihilation of Silicon Valley - but May Day (Grace Jones) saved the day by riding the truck carrying the detonator out of the mine!
So, on the basis of the anticipated 'minor tremors', once fracking begins, I'll add my own reference to the ending of another film, the rather entertaining Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood musical, 'Paint Your Wagon' (1969) . . . The theory was that the gold-bearing land had all been accounted for, so the ingenious ones would 'clean up' instead on the 'marginals', by driving tunnels beneath all the saloons where gold dust had been spilled beneath the boards . . .
