When the Delaware River Basin Commission proposed a ban on high-volume fracking for natural gas in the basin, arguing it “poses significant, immediate and long-term risks” to the watershed, one environmentalist called it “a huge and groundbreaking protection.”
But there weren’t only celebrations. Environmental leaders said the proposed rules don’t make sense because even though they ban fracking in the basin, they allow operations outside the watershed to treat wastewater in the river and to use water from the Delaware for fracking elsewhere.
Former DRBC executive director Carol Collier disagrees. She said the draft proposal, released in November, is positive for the basin’s water quality and quantity.