Alex Lightman The oil and gas industry doesnt only produce those primary sources of air pollution. It also produces brown journalism. This news by Mark Green is an example of brown journalism: meant to make the greatest sources of pollution and weakness appear like strengths. The dirty secret of natural gas is that if 3% of the well leaks, its more polluting than coal. So creating a brown journalism news item from a credible source (MIT) that claims minimal leakage settles the issue, right? Citing MIT is a time honored way to shut people up. Except that if you went to MIT and paid attention, you know that its a logical fallacy to think that a source of a claim makes it more true. The fatal flaw of the MIT study cited was to only look at the first eight days of a wells life and then claim minimal leakage. But wells last for years, even decades, so this is like saying, The newborn infant from Netherlands did not commit any crimes of violence in his first week of life. Therefore, no male or female will ever commit a crime in his or her life. There are about 15 million people in the Netherlands and the US frackers plan to drill at least 15 million wells, so the analogy is just as relevant as the study. I think that anytime you find an article by Mark Green or other person on the payroll of the frackers you will find an obvious flaw. And its vital that you do.
Posted on: Thu, 14 Nov 2013 16:54:44 +0000