In partnership with ProPublica, DeSmog and Inside Climate News.
The oil and gas industry’s wastewater problem is a trillion-gallon ticking time bomb beneath our feet. For decades, drillers have injected this toxic waste product of oil and gas production back underground. But increasingly, it doesn’t stay where it should. Instead, it’s spreading for miles, irreversibly contaminating drinking water or blasting back to the surface.
In the past few months, a series of groundbreaking investigations have shed light on the industry’s wastewater crisis. Together, they show that this problem isn’t isolated to a few rural oil fields. It’s threatening land, water and people all over the country…