Michigan grants fracking contract near Detroit

A Texas-based business has been granted a high-volume hydraulic fracturing – or fracking – permit to extract natural gas, crude oil or both in a Michigan community.

According to a report in the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus of Howell, Mich., GeoSouthern Energy received permission from Michigan earlier this month. The project is planned for Livingston County’s Conway Township, located about 90 kilometers northwest of Detroit.

GeoSouthern’s Michigan Department of Environmental Quality permit allows the company to drill about 4,400 feet into the ground and 5,000 horizontally. The permit allows injection of three million gallons of water, as well as sand and a mixture of as many as 30 chemicals.

Fracking can be used to access enormous quantities of crude oil, and especially natural gas, from previously uneconomic deposits trapped deep underground in isolated pockets within sedimentary rock known as shale. The natural gas is a key ingredient of key resins such as polyethylene.