Most
observers would agree, though, that changes in regulation do not come
from objective scientific studies. (Both sides, after all, can flood
any government hearing with experts and impressive-looking scientific
reports.) Regulations are determined, in large part, by politics. And
the politics of fracking are changing and are very likely to change
drastically in coming years. As examples from the last century
suggest, the sudden discovery of oil and gas can transform an entire
economy and regulatory system to serve the industry’s interests.
Economists call this the resource curse — the perverse process in
which a valuable discovery like oil, gas, diamonds or gold ends up
enriching a few at the cost of impoverishing most of the population.
At its worst, the resource curse leads to deeply corrupt regimes like
those in Iraq, Iran, Myanmar and Libya. At its mildest, this can
create one-industry economies in which there is little innovation and
even less resistance to the whims of a handful of powerful interests.
Many believe this already describes the oil economies of Louisiana,
Texas and Oklahoma and, increasingly, North Dakota, where the
fracking industry is entrenched. Politically and economically, it’s
hard to argue with an industry that has helped keep the state’s
unemployment rate at about 3 percent.
If
there is an uneasy equilibrium, right now, between environmentally
concerned citizens and pro-fracking industrial groups, what will the
political balance be like in a decade? What pressures will be on
state legislatures and regulators if the projections are true and the
millions of workers in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and maybe
New York will owe their jobs to fracking. There will be trillions of
dollars of new wealth. Will environmental and health concerns have
any chance against that juggernaut?
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