“Oil is the biggest part of our economy around here with agriculture, and maybe some manufacturing,” said Ted Whitehead, chairman of the Clay County Board. Whitehead works for a company that transports oil to a refinery in Indiana.<\/p>\n Clay County in southern Illinois, a coveted area for potential fracking\u00a0and at the center of the controversy, covers wide swaths of farmland sprinkled by grain silos, farmhouses and oil pump jacks bobbing up and down. It sits atop the Illinois Basin, home to most of the state\u2019s 650 oil fields. The fallen remnants of last year’s crop fill the fields along with an occasional pump jack marking traditional vertical wells that are still in use.<\/p>\n Companies have been drilling in Clay County since they discovered oil there in the 1940s, making it one of the nation\u2019s top producers. Reserves depleted over the years, but the potential for reaching rich new veins trapped in bedrock with high-tech, hydraulic techniques promises a renaissance for the industry. Last year, out-of-town oil representatives flooded the tight-knit county, researching which land to lease to begin fracking. But that abruptly stopped.<\/p>\n Unemployment rose to 8.1 percent – one of the highest rates in the state – as oil prices dropped.<\/p>\n Illinois opened the door in November for companies to obtain permits for high-volume hydraulic fracturing, the process of extracting hard-to-reach oil from shale using high-pressure water and chemicals. Yet unlike other states where fracking is thriving \u2013 enough to flood the world\u2019s oil market and contribute to a plunge in crude prices \u2013 Illinois appears to be in limbo.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have some oil pumps on our land but we don\u2019t own any,\u201d said Katie Lewis, 21, who grew up in Clay County. \u201cWe don\u2019t own the pumps or the oil, but what they do for us is we get a check every month. It\u2019s a percent of what the oil makes every month.\u201d<\/p>\n Her family, like many farmers and landowners in the area, leases their land to oil companies to run pump jacks. Lewis, who is studying agriculture at Northwestern University, said the pumps on the 1,600-acre farm near Xenia, Illinois, help supplement income from corn and soybeans.<\/p>\n At Anthony\u2019s Wild West & Fallout Saloon –\u00a0patrons say it’s the only restaurant in the U.S. with an oil drill for a bar footrest –\u00a0four men who have been friends for decades discuss life, business and oil. Restaurant owner Anthony Booth stops by to talk and doesn\u2019t conceal his disappointment at a drop in business.<\/p>\n \u201cTen months ago we had a lot of people here checking out leases,\u201d he said. \u201cNow all of that has changed. We haven\u2019t seen one of them in months.\u201d<\/p>\n The men all seem to agree.<\/p>\n Brenda Britton, Clay County clerk and recorder, said in January that no companies had come into the courthouse to search for mineral rights for 10 months.<\/p>\n Some companies did lease land to test for\u00a0fracking, though. In July 2014 Denver-based oil company Strata-X Energy purchased leases for 67,000 acres of farmland.<\/p>\n Theories abound about what precipitated the sudden halt in interest from fracking companies. Plunging oil prices tops the list. When Strata-X began production tests on horizontally drilled wells in the Illinois basin, they quoted oil prices of $95.75 per barrel. By January oil process had dropped to around $40 on the global market.<\/p>\n \u201cWe missed out on zillions of dollars.\u201d <\/p>\n – Andy Knapp<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Southern Illinois oil workers are remarkably well-versed in international relations among players that include Saudi Arabia, Russia, the Middle East and Ukraine. The faraway places directly affect the livelihood of the people harvesting in the breadbasket of America.<\/p>\n Chris Mitchell, president of Geo. N. Mitchell Drilling Co. Inc. in Carmi, about 300 miles south of Chicago, said he believes that the rise of U.S. fracking destabilized the oil market.<\/p>\n \u201cI think [the drop in oil prices] is all fabricated,\u201d he said. \u201cThe margin between having too much and not enough oil is about a million barrels a day. To me and you that\u2019s a lot but to the people doing the exporting it\u2019s not a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n Three OPEC countries primarily control its oil output: Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, he said, and they want to keep their market share.<\/p>\n \u201cWe put these successful shale plays and increased the production in the U.S.,” he said, “meaning we\u2019re increasing the exports, so wherever that spreads out of the market because the U.S. is taking less. So they\u2019re going to go out and spank the shale players\u2019 butt by putting more oil in the market forcing the price down.”<\/p>\n “They\u2019re already succeeding in that several rigs in Texas, Oklahoma, North Dakota, have been shut down because of the price.”<\/p>\n – Chris Mitchell, Geo. N. Mitchell Drilling Co. Inc.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n OPEC producers know that fracking for oil in the Eagle Ford and Bakken shale \u2013 oil from the Dakotas \u2013 costs more to produce, so it takes more for companies to get their money back.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, if the price is low it\u2019s going to hurt them,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re already succeeding in that several rigs in Texas, Oklahoma, North Dakota, have been shut down because of the price. They\u2019re already getting the point across.\u201d<\/p>\n A serendipitous sudden escalation in prices wouldn\u2019t instantly return the momentum, though. David Hettich, chief financial officer and vice president of land for Strata-X, called high oil prices a \u201cprimary driver\u201d for renewed interest in fracking, but the reality is more complex. Opponents concerned with the environmental impact of fracking in Illinois\u00a0stalled the process of passing regulations and continue to thwart interested companies, he said. Years of clashing with opposition groups have exasperated him, he said.<\/p>\n “Now the rules are out – we have oil and gas depressed prices. It\u2019s a combination of depressed oil and gas prices currently and regulatory fatigue,\u201d Hettich said.<\/p>\n For Hettich, the hurdles may outweigh the rewards, since no one has yet even proven that high-volume hydraulic fracking will work in the state. Other states allowed fracking and began implementing regulations after it was underway and worked with businesses to implement them, he said. Illinois, a late-comer, wants every detail in place up front, he added, but the heavy regulations may amount to a barrier.<\/p>\n Illinois had the benefit of seeing the growing pains and regulatory gaps in the states at the forefront of fracking and is trying to address them upfront. But companies say they find the permit application, which spans an arduous 300 to 400 pages, vague in ways that leave them open to litigation.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a combination of depressed oil and gas prices currently and regulatory fatigue.\u201d <\/p>\n – David Hettich, Strata-X<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cThe Illinois Department of Natural Resources is terribly understaffed to be reviewing this application,\u201d Hettich said. \u201cSay they make a mistake. It can be something totally nebulous. It could be I didn\u2019t get the right approval from a landowner \u2013 the same people show up to protest, then sue them. Then sue the company.\u201d<\/p>\n Any error can leave a company a target for a lawsuit, which can drag them into court for years. The first five companies will have the most difficulty navigating the application, and after that companies should have a pattern to follow.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re trying to figure out how to get a handle on it right now. We can drill vertical wells in Illinois and establish production and not be continuously harassed,\u201d Hettich said.<\/p>\n Pressure from environmental advocates has also left companies wary of\u00a0applying for permits because the process requires them to make their names public, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn talking to the other companies in the basin, they met the Department of Natural Resources, they all eventually will put in an application,\u201d he said. \u201cWhether in mid or next year or I don\u2019t know. They don\u2019t want to register because they will become fodder for the opposition group.\u201d<\/p>\n Environmental concerns played through the passage of Illinois\u2019 fracking regulations. Environmentalists warned that fracking raised risks of poisoning the state versus making it money. With demands of both sides set at equally loud volumes, the contentious debate presented a politician\u2019s worst nightmare.<\/p>\n Strata-X had leased land in 2011 in Illinois and the leases gave them the right to explore for a stated period of years and then produce on it indefinitely. After spending millions of dollars on the exploration rights, the state decided it would pass new regulations. Hettich said. \u00a0What the company thought would be a short process\u00a0for legislation and regulations\u00a0ended up taking two and a half years from when the land was leased.<\/p>\n \u201cOne day [Governor Pat] Quinn would say he was in favor of a moratorium,\u201d Hettich said. \u201cThe next day he\u2019d say he was yelling at someone for not going quick enough. He was hitting the break and the gas pedal. He didn\u2019t move the rules forward in expeditious ways. He literally took every day he could but two\u201d before one deadline.<\/p>\n He compared fracking to marijuana and concealed handguns in terms of its controversial nature.\u00a0 Anti-fracking “elves” <\/a>delivered a beribboned personal fracking rig to Governor\u00a0Quinn’s house during the 2013 holiday season, according to the Facebook page of Chicagoland Against Fracking. Some opponents left a coffin, tombstone and flowers – representing the death of Illinois – at the office of a state representative who\u00a0 proposed a bill to \u00a0streamline the regulations process. The first draft of regulations received 30,000 comments, submitted by about 100 people.<\/p>\n Environmental advocates openly admit it\u2019s not just rigorous regulations that they want \u2013 they want no fracking at all. Fracking opponent Vito Mastrangelo, a lawyer who has lived in unincorporated Justin County, just north of Clay County, for 30 years. He has no oil wells on his land. Mastrangelo became involved in the anti-fracking campaign after he read in the newspaper about what might happen in Illinois.<\/p>\n [youtube http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=7RaU3tBmoGk&w=560&h=315]<\/p>\n He runs legal affairs for Southern Illinoisans Against Fracturing Our Environment (SAFE), a group that demands a complete\u00a0fracking ban in the state. The group grew out of meetings his fellow concerned citizens began holding shortly after the news broke.<\/p>\n In contrast to Hettich\u2019s view, Mastrangelo believes fracking opponents were not given enough say in the rule-making process that opened the gateway to the permit process. And he, along with SAFE and several landowners, have filed a lawsuit alleging defects in the way the Department of Natural Resources made the final rules. The violations he believes occurred primarily center around not giving the public enough say in the process.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re probably aware that DNR points out that there were thousands of comments. And there were five hearings around the state. But what most people don\u2019t realize is that there was a hearing in Chicago and there were four others down south \u2013 Effingham, Decatur, Carbondale and Ina. And the one in Chicago, they didn\u2019t have enough capacity in the room. They had to turn people away,\u201d Mastrengelo said.<\/p>\n Southern Illinoisans, the people that I know that do not support fracking, feel vastly underrepresented both within environmental organizations and within the legislature in general.<\/p>\n – Vito Mastrangelo, Lawyer<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cBasically DNR took the position that they had to allow the public defense, but at these public hearings and in other instances we\u2019re arguing that they did not give us the opportunities to engage this department in how the rules were made,\u201d Mastrangelo said.<\/p>\n The Illinois Department of Natural Resources did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n \u201cMy spin on it, and I\u2019m speaking only personally now, not on behalf of SAFE or anybody else, is industry has much more lobbying power than any environmental organization or individuals. Southern Illinoisans, the people that I know that do not support fracking, feel vastly underrepresented both within environmental organizations and within the legislature in general. We believe the industry has \u2013 they donate tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars to legislators,\u201d he said. \u201cThey basically got the last word, let\u2019s put it that way.\u201d<\/p>\n In addition to legislative procedures, Mastrangelo fears for the environmental consequences of a procedure that has raised alarms in the scientific community.<\/p>\n \u201cFor years we\u2019ve been told that there is a pretty good chance that there will be an earthquake pretty soon\u2026 So when we learned that injection wells cause earthquakes and even fracking can cause earthquakes it\u2019s kind of a non sequitir: Earthquakes are bad; we\u2019re going to do something that causes earthquakes. There\u2019s a little big of illogic going on there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Chemicals used in fracking have also been found to be toxic, Mastrangelo\u00a0said.<\/p>\n Hettich argued that fracking uses only three materials \u2013 sand, water and chemicals.\u00a0 He said\u00a0chemical components used include\u00a0glycol (soap), an antibacterial, a gel and possibly potassium. The amount of chemicals used equals less than 2 percent of the overall fluid makeup.<\/p>\n The water and chemicals are pumped into the earth at high pressure to break up the bedrock and release the oil.<\/p>\n Hettich said that fracking engineers protect fresh water near ground level during drilling by surrounding the pipe with layers of materials: rock, cement, steel, rock, cement and steel. The oil they extract also exists far below the fresh water table.<\/p>\n Stephen Nickels, a board member of SAFE and vehement opponent of fracking, strongly disagrees. Nickels grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and moved to southern Illinois when he and his wife bought her family farm. In Chicago, he worked on the floor of the Chicago Board of Options Exchange and later opened his own\u00a0firm. Nickels has studied the science and economics of fracking in-depth and come to support SAFE\u2019s unequivocal position.<\/p>\n \u201cFracking is an inherently dangerous extraction technology\u00a0which cannot be made safe through any amount of regulation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n For instance, the sand Hettich mentioned, while sounding innocuous and natural, is actually silica sand, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cSilica sand, once airborne, can travel 20 miles,\u201d Nickels said. \u201cSilica sand will \u2013 will<\/em> \u2013 give the people doing the fracking and potentially the people living in the area of fracking, exposure to silicosis. Silicosis will be the black lung of the fracking generation,\u201d he said. \u201cSilicosis essentially turns your lungs to cement and you die. Period.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFracking is an inherently dangerous extraction technology which cannot be made safe through any amount of regulation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n – Stephen Nickels, SAFE<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The next environmental contaminant he mentioned is methane, a gas that oil drillers flare off when they drill for oil and that has been linked to global warming. He described a satellite image taken of earth that eerily demonstrates the size of the problem.<\/p>\n \u201cYou see Chicago and it\u2019s bright and huge, and you see Minneapolis-St. Paul and it\u2019s not quite as bright as Chicago and not quite as big, but it\u2019s still fairly well lit up, and you see North Dakota\u2019s Bakken oil field, and it looks just as bright as Minneapolis,\u201d he said. \u201cBecause they\u2019re flaring that much gas\u2026When you see North Dakota looking like Minneapolis-St. Paul, you get the idea.\u201d<\/p>\n Nickels also warned against the effects of the chemicals used in fracking, saying, \u201cThey don\u2019t just use soap. That\u2019s bullshit. There are 650 chemicals that have been identified as being part of frack solutions.\u201d<\/p>\n New York \u00a0Gov. \u00a0Andrew Cuomo banned fracking in New York in December after a\u00a0 New York State Department of Health review <\/a>examined the\u00a0health risks linked to\u00a0the activity.<\/p>\n “I have 80 acres here in Johnson County where Woolsey [Energy Corporation] sold 199 leases,\u201d Nickels sad. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t lease my land to a fracker for all the tea in China, as it were. For any amount of money. Nobody wants to live right next to a frack, period.\u201d<\/p>\n Nickels also said believes that people have overblown the potential economic benefits of fracking.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was a Marcellus Shale study done by multiple universities, I want to say three years ago, and it states unequivocally that there are 3.2 jobs generated per well drilled,\u201d he said. \u201cThe majority of those jobs are \u2018Mcjobs.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n He said the largest number of jobs likely to be generated fall in the service industry sector – restaurant help, gas station service workers, strip club dancers, bar tenders and truck drivers.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd those people end up not even being able to live in the area anymore because of the influx of people that come with fracking,\u201d he said.\u00a0 Fracking companies \u201cbring their own professional crews with each rig. They\u2019re not looking to hire local people to frack a hole. All those high-paying jobs, they all come with them and leave with them.\u201d<\/p>\n Fracking will never get that far though, he prected, stressing the precarious economics of the situation. He gave the example of Woolsey Energy, a Kansas company that bought mineral rights to 260,000 acres of land in southern Illinois for about$26 million. Purchased three to four years ago, the five-year leases will soon expire or be up for renewal, which costs a fee.<\/p>\n \u201cCertainly nobody who has put up $26 million and got nothing in return for it is going to dump another $26 million in unless he\u2019s damn sure that the price of oil is going to remain high enough to make that a viable investment,\u201d he said. \u201cThe whole geopolitical price of oil as it is currently constituted is just one nail after another in the coffin of the shale industry of the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"County](\"http:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2015\/02\/TWhitehead.jpg\")
<\/a>Oil and Farms – The Recipe for the Southern Illinois Economy<\/h1>\n
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<\/a>What Stopped Fracking<\/h1>\n
Companies Clash with Environmentalists<\/h1>\n
Environmentalists Continue the Fight<\/h1>\n
Fracking Opponents<\/h1>\n
The Chemical Cocktail of Fracking<\/h1>\n
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