Chemicals in hydraulic fracking are capable of disrupting the endocrine systems of fish and potentially humans, says a new study out in the journal Science of the Total Environment. The study found high levels of hormone disruption in water around a fracking wastewater disposal site in Fayetteville, West Virginia, reports Environmental Health News.
Fracking mixes chemicals, many of which have been linked to “cancer, hormone impacts and reproductive problems” with sand and water to create a fluid that is then injected into the ground to break up oil and gas deposits. A single fracking well is responsible for an estimated one million gallons of wastewater. And of the 1,000 different chemicals used in fracking, 100 are known hormone disruptors.
The West Virginia study discovered “considerably higher” levels of estrogen, androgen and thyroid receptor activity around the disposal sites, due to wastewater leaching into waterways. If the same pattern holds up elsewhere, people and fish living near the roughly 36,000 fracking wastewater disposal sites in the U.S. may all be at risk. Very little testing has been conducted to assure the safety of surface water at these sites.
“The [endocrine-disrupting] activity is worrisome for local fish—such contamination seems to affect the reproductive development of some fish species, which can lead to threatened populations,” says Environmental Health News. “In recent years researchers are finding more “intersex” fish—male fish with some female reproductive parts—and believe the culprit is endocrine-disrupting chemicals in water.”
Industry reps denied the study’s health warnings, saying that the levels of endocrine-disrupting hormones in the water are not high enough to pose a problem. The study’s authors admit that the samples they took at the disposal sites may have included wastewater from other industries, making it impossible to lay total blame on fracking.