The controversial method of natural gas production known as hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking" has emerged as a key campaign issue in the 2024 US presidential race between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, given its importance to voters in the battleground state of Pennsylvania. The state’s embrace of new fracking and drilling techniques in the first decade of the 21st century kicked off a boom in natural gas extraction which has pushed the state's annual production higher than Canada or Qatar. There are currently close to 13,000 active so-called "unconventional" gas wells across the state, according to data from Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection. Scientists, environmentalists, and public health experts around the world have called for fracking to be banned, citing the health and climate impacts of the fracking phase of the extraction process, and the long-term environmental damage caused by the continued burning of fossil fuels.
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00:00This area we stand on was, a little over three years ago, was nothing but a forest.
00:12It was a tree, all trees.
00:14It was very high, very steep, and it was basically all that anybody and the old people could
00:20do was allow the timber to grow.
00:43You know, it's definitely helped the financial benefits as far as the community continues
00:48to do well because they're getting royalties off of the gas wells, so that's a good thing.
01:11So you better think this gas, it ain't going to be here forever, but by God I'll tell you,
01:18it's a means of supply and what they're running around here complaining in this and it's these
01:24radicals.
01:41As far as my opinion, I believe the man has enough common sense to realize that this is
02:10a source of income, it's a source of bargaining in the world.
02:35I grew up in a coal mining community not far from here and it's sad to see the state
02:41of a lot of those places, but with the oil and gas, they established a new tax structure
02:48in Pennsylvania to where a lot of the money is diverted back to the local communities,
02:53counties.
03:20I believe that your word is your bond, like your word should matter.
03:24So the fact that somebody said even recently, like I guess Kamala changed her opinion about
03:29fracking, like if you said that years ago that you were going to shut down fracking
03:34and you're not going to allow fracking, well, I believe as Americans we should honor each
03:39other's word.
03:58With politics aside, fracking has been positive, I would say, all around.
04:05So to be anti-fracking is kind of like being anti-farmer, right?
04:10How do you get rid of the farmer?
04:11You can't really get rid of the farmer.
04:13You know, now that fracking has worked as well as it has, there was a point in time,
04:18at least when Trump was president, that we were energy independent.
04:23I thought that was a pretty good thing for the economy, a pretty good thing for America.
04:36We don't have any active wells on our farm, but I know that we get residuals from mining
04:43underneath, like the gas being extracted that way.
04:46So I know, like personally, we're not thrilled about the environmental impact of it, but
04:52we know that the money is important to people.
05:03There's too much money and momentum behind fracking as an industry.
05:08It's going to happen, no matter who, like really, no matter a Democrat or a Republican
05:14at this point, it's going to happen.
05:16It's bought and sold already.
05:18The deals are done.