Too much danger

The bill to legalize fracking will not protect North Carolinians from a very dangerous situation. The Shearon Harris nuclear power plant sits in the middle of the largest shale oil bed in North Carolina. Many drilling sites will be just 15 miles away from it.

Shearon-Harris is no ordinary power plant: It is the largest nuclear waste depository in the nation. It keeps highly radioactive spent fuel rods from other nuclear plants in large cooling pools. If one of those pools were to crack – like they did in Japan from earthquakes – there would be disastrous nuclear fires and possibly a full nuclear meltdown. Even one pool fire could contaminate thousands of square miles of North Carolina land for years to come.

Does fracking cause earthquakes? There is a clear possibility, according to a recent study by the U.S. Geological Survey. And fracking was discontinued in Great Britain after earthquakes were detected near fracking sites. The British company drilling the wells reported that fracking likely caused the quakes.

This bill to legalize fracking should not be passed. It is a bad bill that exposes our state to a very real danger and a possible catastrophe.

Edwin R. Budd

Cary