Over the past nine months The New York Times has gathered 30,000 pages of documents in a mounting case against the practices and impacts of natural gas drilling. Obtained through open records requests, visits to drilling sites and document leaks, Drilling Down shows the devastating effects of extraction in many regions. In Pennsylvania, a confidential draft of a 2010 document the Environmental Protection Agency warned "human health and anvironmental impacts are expected to escalate."
Both major parties, energy companies even some environmentalists continue to condone the expansion of natural gas drilling across the continent. Above is a 2006 satellite photo of drilling sites and waste-water pools in Uinta Basin in northeast Utah.
( Flickr/SkyTruth)
