The Frackers: The Outrageous Inside Story of the New Billionaire Wildcatters, Hardcover

Descriere

Everyone knew it was crazy to try to extract oil and natural gas buried in shale rock deep below the ground. Everyone, that is, except a few reckless wildcatters - who risked their careers to prove the world wrong. Things looked grim for American energy in 2006. Oilproduction was in steep decline and natural gas washard to find. The Iraq War threatened the nation salready tenuous relations with the Middle East. China was rapidly industrializing and competing forresources. Major oil companies had just about givenup on new discoveries on U. S. soil, and a new energycrisis seemed likely. But a handful of men believed everything wasabout to change. Far from the limelight, Aubrey Mc Clendon, Harold Hamm, Mark Papa, and other wildcatterswere determined to tap massive deposits of oil andgas that Exxon, Chevron, and other giants had dismissedas a waste of time. By experimenting withhydraulic fracturing through extremely dense shale a process now known as fracking the wildcattersstarted a revolution. In just a few years, they solved America s dependence on imported energy, triggereda global environmental controversy and made andlost astonishing fortunes. No one understands these men their ambitions, personalities, methods, and foibles betterthan the award-winning Wall Street Journal reporter Gregory Zuckerman. His exclusive access enabledhim to get close to the frackers and chronicle theuntold story of how they transformed the nation andthe world. The result is a dramatic narrative trackinga brutal competition among headstrong drillers. It stretches from the barren fields of North Dakotaand the rolling hills of northeastern Pennsylvaniato cluttered pickup trucks in Texas and tense Wall Street boardrooms. Activists argue that the same methods that arecreating so much new energy are also harming ourwater supply and threatening environmental chaos. The Frackers tells the story of the angry oppositionunleashed by this revolution and explores just howdangerous fracking really is. The fracker