Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking and Associated Gas and Oil Infrastructure

The Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking and Associated Gas and Oil Infrastructure (the Compendium) is a fully referenced compilation of evidence, spanning many scientific and social scientific fields, documenting continuing and increasing impacts on health and environment.

The risks and harms of fracking for public health, the climate, and environmental justice are real and growing. Many early warnings in our previous editions have been borne out. The growing and substantial body of research reveals fundamental problems with the entire life cycle of operations associated with fracking and its infrastructure, which includes pipelines, LNG terminals, frack sand mining operations, and gas stoves inside homes.

For this ninth edition of the Compendium, as prior ones, we compiled findings from three sources: articles from peer-reviewed medical or scientific journals; investigative reports by journalists; reports from, or commissioned by, government agencies; and, when they provide otherwise inaccessible data, advocacy organizations. Our entries briefly describe these studies and reports that document harm, or risk of harm, linked with fracking and associated oil and gas infrastructure, and summarize the principal findings. The studies and investigations referenced in the Compendium’s dated entries in the “Compilation of Studies & Findings” (the main body) are current through June 1, 2023 and are organized by sixteen topic areas. The “Front Matter” contains a range of other information, including a Summary of Findings, historical, political, cultural, and economic contexts and updates, late-breaking studies, and the seventeen trends that we have identified and which articulate strong patterns within and across our topic areas.

Download the full edition of the 9th Compendium

Our examination uncovered no evidence that fracking can be practiced in a manner that does not threaten human health directly or without imperiling climate stability upon which human health depends.