The selectmen, the state, and 34 other towns in Connecticut have been duped to enact these anti-fracking waste ordinances by the left wing, Washington-based non-governmental organization Food & Water Watch (FWW), whose true goal is to stop fossil fuel and natural gas production in the USA. Prohibiting fracking waste is the means.

There is no scientific truth to FWW’s scare tactics. Some instances of drinking water contamination occur, but considering 90 percent of new oil and gas wells use hydraulic fracking, instances are small. Fracking is a short-cycle operation usually lasting one to three weeks. Of course, there could be spills, but there is no known lasting contamination, since there are lined drilling pits and injection wells on site. Drilling is monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency and through 39 states, two tribes, and two territories. Only one percent of the fracking fluid is made up of potentially toxic chemicals and there have been no known reports of fracking fluid causing cancer. You can look it up on fracfocus.org. The best story I read about is the Pennsylvania farmer who claimed a natural gas well killed his cows, but it was E. coli in the farm pond—simply put, manure. More than 90 percent of new oil and gas wells in the USA undergo hydraulic fracking. Using natural gas instead of coal saves Americans as much as $800 per year, and has reduced carbon emissions from power plants by more than 10 percent since 2005.

I’m here to defend hydraulic fracking and to alert the community as to who FWW is. Another of FWW’s objectives is to oppose the private ownership of water companies, and have water a government-controlled commodity. Will the Connecticut Water Company, a public, privately owned company, be the next object of a Madison ordinance? I encourage the selectmen to Google “Food & Water Watch” before they vote on this ordinance.

Bob Roxbrough

Madison