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Well, it has certainly supplied lower energy costs to US manufacturers (and more marginally, to consumers), displacing coal and making certain energy-intensive industries more internationally competitive. So it seems they are being subsidised by the investors who are losing money on their gas wells? (And of course, by the incalculable environmental damage.)

It is rightly acknowledged that people of faith have no monopoly of virtue - Queen Elizabeth II
by eurogreen on Tue Apr 29th, 2014 at 05:16:07 AM EST
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The frackers were so successful at getting investment money and drilling wells that they really shot themselves with their own gun.  They flooded the gas market and drove prices way down below production costs.  

The consumers got a temporary benefit, but even conventional drilling could not show a profit at the low market prices.  

So then everybody lost money.  

Well, not the scammers, at least, mostly not.  They had been planning to cash out and run all along, it was just a matter of doing it earlier than expected.

--Gaianne  

The Fates are kind.

by Gaianne on Wed Apr 30th, 2014 at 08:47:23 PM EST
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