UPDATE: The vote on Novemeber 21st was moved because of all of our involvement. I personally went to my first real protest. It was inspiring. We got to meet Josh Fox. Although this petition says ban it for Novemeber 21st, it is still going on, and I would appreciate if you would please sign it. Thank you everyone for your support!

The Delaware River Basin supplies nearly 15.6 million people with fresh drinking water. This is roughly 5% of the U.S. population. Hydraulic Fracturing, or Fracking, is a risky way of drilling for natural gas. It involves the use of fracking liquid that is blasted into the ground. This liquid contains a mixture of 596 different chemicals and also an estimated 1-7 million gallons of water is needed each time a well is fracked. A well can be fracked up to 18 times in its life. In places where they have already started fracking, many people do not have drinkable water. Some affected communities have water that is so contaminated that they can light a match to it and it will catch fire.
One of the reasons that this has been allowed to happen in our country, is because former Vice President Dick Cheney suggested to Congress that they should exempt hydraulic fracturing from the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Clean Air Act in 2001. This has enabled fracking to go on and contaminate the basic necessities of life, denying people of their right to clean air and water. In affected parts of our country, the Oil and Gas companies have denied that there are any problems with the drinking water, yet they refuse to drink it themselves. This is a serious issue that not many people know about and it is crucial that we spread the word.
On November 21, 2011, there will be a vote in Trenton, New Jersey to either approve or deny the building of 20,000 fracking wells in the Delaware River Basin area. My goal is the make you aware of this situation and to ask you to please sign this petition and keep it circulating. The mission of my petition is to request that President Obama and our local government prevent this practice from continuing to pollute our air and water. Due to the effects of fracking, France has become the first country to ban this method of acquiring natural gas and I believe that the United States should follow in their footsteps.