The acting environmental commissioner of New York City has called on New York state to withdraw its draft regulations approving the natural gas drilling in its watershed.
New York City environmental officials said Wednesday that months of scientific research had indicated that hydraulic drilling for natural gas upstate could contaminate the watershed serving the city.
The study, undertaken by the city's Department of Environmental Protection, also showed that the drilling could damage infrastructure, including aqueducts, the officials told the city's water board at a briefing.
In a forceful letter to the State Department of Environmental Conservation on Tuesday, the city's acting environmental commissioner, Steven W. Lawitts, called on the state to withdraw its draft regulations approving the drilling.
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Already concerned about the watershed, the city's environmental department hired scientists and environmental engineers who specialize in gas drilling last January to research the potential impact of the drilling. The report concludes that drilling is dangerous for several reasons.
Extracting gas from the shale involves blasting water mixed with chemicals into the rock at a high pressure, which causes the natural gas to flow out. But the process results in significant amounts of wastewater, which can contaminate water supplies and damage the infrastructure, the report found.
Twenty percent to 50 percent of the chemicals used in extraction ends up in the wastewater, for which the state has no disposal method, said Paul Rush, the department's deputy commissioner, who presented the report at the briefing.
He added that the projected operating costs would increase water rates for New York City residents by at least 30 percent because an increase in filtering costs.
Mr. Rush said the environmental engineers and scientists hired by the department collected data from hydraulic fracturing in other states to draw their conclusions.
"We took a technical look at this and made a decision based on the science," he said.
Citing data from drilling in Fayetteville, Ark., the scientists estimated that drilling in the New York watershed could result in hundreds of tons of chemicals per day seeping through the watershed over a 20-year period.
Substantial industrial development would be needed to dig and maintain the 3,000 to 6,000 wells in the watershed, the report said. Maintenance alone could result in up to 600,000 trips by truck per year within the watershed's boundaries, it said.
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Mehul Patel, a member of the water board, also spoke out against the drilling at the meeting. "We're trading off the most precious natural resource we have," he said. "It's appalling to me that the state would consider this."
