The oil and gas boom from horizontal hydraulic fracturing has led to more and more wells popping up in neighborhoods, which means extra money for landowners, but also eyesores, loud noises, and increased vehicular traffic for neighbors, Russell Gold and Tom McGinty report for
The Wall Street Journal. The newspaper "analyzed well location and census data for more
than 700 counties in 11 major energy-producing states. At least 15.3
million Americans lived within a mile of a well that has been drilled
since 2000. That is more people than live in Michigan or New York City."
In some areas, such as Johnson County, Texas, just south of Fort Worth, the energy boom has really taken off. In 2000, the county had 18 oil and gas wells; today there are 3,914, and 99.5 percent of the 150,000 residents live within a mile of a well, Gold and McGinty write. Much the same has happened in North Dakota, Pennsylvania and Colorado. Mountrail County, N.D., has gone from 460 wells in 2000 to 1,808 today. Bradford County, Pa., has gone from 17 wells to 752, and Weld County, Colo., Westmoreland County, Pa. and McMullen County, Tex., have also seen big increases.
(WSJ graphic)
"Nationwide some 23 counties, with more than four million residents, each
had more than three new wells per square mile, according to the 2010
Census and well-location information from
DrillingInfo, a data provider
to the oil industry," Gold and McGinty write. "But the energy isn't coming from a small number of immense wells in some
distant oil field. It is coming from hundreds of thousands of small
wells that now blanket entire counties. Nationwide, the drilling shows little sign of letting up. There are more than five wells, on average, per square mile of Johnson
County. In Pennsylvania, home to the Marcellus Shale, the average is a
little less than one well per square mile. Parts of the commonwealth,
including counties near Pittsburgh, have more than four per square mile." (
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