Shale Gas Boom Creates Market Opportunity to Clean Fracking Water

As U.S. shale gas resources and hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, have entered the national consciousness, protests from nearby residents, then regulation, have followed. Yet rather than being bad for business, this regulation is actually spurring a new market in water technologies, according to a comprehensive report by the Artemis Project, a specialist consulting practice.

In particular, author Purabi Thakre and editor Laura Shenkar believe the rich Marcellus “play” — the gas industry term for large deposits — and its location under heavily populated New York and Pennsylvania are creating a vast market opportunity. “The Marcellus Effect: Building Momentum for Advanced Water Technology Solutions” says, “Experts estimate that shale gas drilling will grow sevenfold over the next 10 years in the Marcellus Shale…. The resulting market for wastewater disposal and treatment in this region alone will exceed $3 billion per year, according to the banking firm Boennings & Scattergood. In addition, Shenkar expects that water technology innovations created for shale plays will find markets in other industries.

An expert on corporate water strategy and water technologies, Shenkar founded the Artemis Project, a consulting firm that advises corporations on water strategy and supports technological innovation in water management. Each year the Artemis Project sponsors the Top 50 Water Companies Competition to identify emerging technologies and investment opportunities in the water sector. This year, 10 of the 50 companies were innovating new technologies to clean up fracking wastewater.

Fracking has been around for decades, but new technology innovations and a higher price for natural gas have recently made it economic to employ it more widely. But Congress, pushed by Vice President Dick Cheney, exempted gas drilling from EPA Clean Water Act regulations in 2005. So as fracking has ramped up, particularly close to where people live, environmental concerns about water quality have emerged. Perhaps the image that best captures people’s concerns is video footage of a man setting his tap water on fire in the documentary film Gasland.