It has fundamentally transformed the United States, and it influenced this election cycle.
It has fundamentally transformed the United States, and it influenced this election cycle.
F racking was front and center in this year’s election, especially in the energy-producing swing state of Pennsylvania. But it is more than a wedge political issue unique to the Keystone State.
Indeed, it’s a critical component of American energy that has multiplier effects on our economy, grid reliability, and national sovereignty. Fracking is also inextricably linked to the cost-of-living concerns that drove voters to the ballot box, and, in an age obsessed with “carbon footprints,” fracking has done more to help reduce emissions than have electric vehicles, solar panels, and wind turbines combined.
Two decades ago, our use of natural gas trailed that of coal and nuclear. Coal provided more than half of American electricity in 2001. But the shale boom of the 2000s, along with improved fracking technology, propelled natural gas to the top of the heap. Now, natural gas is crucial for our grids. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, natural gas powers nearly half of American electricity. In 2023, we produced more electricity by natural gas than we did by nuclear energy and coal combined. Oil also saw a boom. From 2010 to 2020, American crude-oil production nearly tripled.
Fracking enabled American energy independence. In 2018, the United States became a net energy exporter for the first time since World War II — largely thanks to a decade’s worth of shale fracking. Relying less on foreign oil and gas provides the United States the clout and leverage it needs to manage increasingly chaotic international affairs. Now, the United States is the global leader in oil and gas production. With about 264 billion barrels, the U.S. has more oil reserves — and, in fact, more untapped oil — than Russia and Saudi Arabia. States such as Texas, Pennsylvania, and North Dakota contain more untapped resources than some mid-sized countries.
Pennsylvania is an excellent case study of fracking’s transformative power. Before 2008, the now top-tier energy-producing state trailed other states in natural-gas production. The state rests on the Marcellus Shale formation, a massive deposit of oil and gas that stretches across the Appalachian Basin. Before fracking, however, shale extraction was technologically challenging and costly. Horizontal hydraulic fracturing — what we call fracking — changed that, making these wells commercially viable. Pennsylvania now produces about 7.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas annually — second only to Texas. Fracking accounts for nearly all of the state’s natural-gas production.
Fracking has become vital to Pennsylvania’s economy. Its oil and gas sector employs tens of thousands and generates about $75 billion annually — roughly 9 percent of the state’s GDP. Each job in fracking also indirectly supports almost four other jobs in the supply chain. Meanwhile, local-government impact fees, imposed on the construction of oil and gas infrastructure to fund social services, have generated about $180 million in 2023 and about $2.7 billion since 2012.
In line with what we have seen nationally, natural gas reduced Pennsylvania’s carbon footprint drastically. While its neighbor New York cut energy production and adopted draconian environmental policies, between 2018 and 2023, Pennsylvania’s carbon emissions dropped by more than 11 percent while energy output expanded, according to Pennsylvania’s Independent Fiscal Office (IFO). Crediting the drop to natural gas in its analysis, IFO also shows that state CO2 emissions decreased by 10.8 percent from 2022 to 2023 — the state’s largest year-over-year decrease since the 1990s.
This coincidence of reduced emissions and increased energy output wasn’t unique to Pennsylvania. The shift from coal to natural gas drastically cut carbon emissions nationwide. Carbon Brief, a publication not known for its enthusiasm for hydrocarbons, called natural gas the “largest driver” of emissions reduction in the United States. While emissions, between 2001 and 2022, dropped 38 percent, data from the International Energy Agency show that American gas generation more than doubled. Because of natural gas, Americans enjoy the best of both worlds.
It’s no wonder that fracking entered the fray of presidential politics and inspired this year’s major-party candidates to revise their electoral platforms. After receiving flak for her 2019 promise to ban fracking, Vice President Kamala Harris flip-flopped and retracted her more environmentally hawkish stance. Meanwhile, President-elect Donald Trump’s embrace of the “drill, baby, drill” mantra might have helped secure his victory, with exit polls showing that 55 percent of Pennsylvania voters oppose a fracking ban.
Fracking continues to generate significant economic gains, strengthen American energy independence, reduce carbon emissions, and stabilize our grid — and, consequently, it affects our electoral politics. It will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.