PITTSBURGH — In the Colorado mountains, a spike in air pollution
has been linked to a boom in oil and gas drilling. A thousand
miles away on the plains of north Texas, there’s a drilling
boom, too, but some air pollution levels have declined.
Opponents of drilling point to Colorado and say it’s dangerous.
Companies point to Texas and say drilling is safe. The answer
appears to be that drilling can be safe, or it can be dangerous.
Industry practices, enforcement, geography and even snow cover
can minimize or magnify air pollution problems. “It’s like a
vehicle. Some cars drip oil,” said Russell Schnell, deputy
director of the federal Earth System Research Laboratory in
Boulder, Colo. “You have wells that are absolutely tight. And
you have other places where a valve gives out, and you have huge
leaks.” The good news, nearly all sides agree, is that the
technology exists to control methane gas leaks and other air
pollution associated with drilling. The bad news is that the
industry is booming so rapidly that som