83 of Añelo, for example, is in the center of Loma Campana, so it is the area where many of those who work on the wells reside. As of 2018, the Añelo population numbered about 7000 people, triple the number who were living in Añelo at the beginning of the decade. Estimates predict that Añelo will have about 20,000 by 2023 if extraction continues (Rassenfoss, 2018). Añelo and other towns and cities are rapidly growing from small farming villages to places with restaurants, movie theatres, and malls. This economic stimulation has helped the local economy, which has indirectly helped Argentina’s national economy. At the same time, as with boomtowns anywhere, when the economy turns sour following a downturn in demand, due to broader market pricing changes or a shift to alternative energy sources, the resulting constrictions can be devastating to all those newly developed businesses and services. Argentina’s existing economic instability was only worsened by the collapse of global energy markets in 2020, which caused a drastic decrease in the prices of global oil and natural gas. The resulting exacerbated economic turmoil, considered at the national level or at the regional level, raises the question of whether or not to continue producing oil and natural gas if the costs of extraction exceed the income. Environmental Implications Oil and gas fracking can have both positive and negative environmental implications. On one side of the ledger are potential reductions in electricity generation contributions to global warming, if gas as an energy source can replace older coal-fired power plants. Indirectly, climate-friendly, renewable energy sources used in the electric generation sphere may, over time, free up more gas for export, thereby enhancing economic growth. Argentina has incredible renewable energy potential2 that is being ignored due to the emphasis on oil and gas extraction. Renewables may reduce the need for gas, making fracking even less economically feasible. On the other side of the environmental ledger, increased methane (CH4) 2See the article by Heller in this volume for a discussion of the role of renewables in the generation of electricity and its implications for reduced carbon emissions. gas emissions contribute to global warming. Expanded water consumption for the fracking process increases the likelihood of earthquakes (Riego, 2020) and also contaminates water used for domestic purposes. Each of these concerns necessitates serious consideration if Argentina moves forward with fracking. Climate change is an issue that unconventional oil and gas (UOG) extraction will continue to exacerbate. In this regard, although the media is heavily fixated on the atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2), CH4 actually insulates heat approximately 100 times stronger than CO2, and it is the main chemical in natural gas (Howarth, 2015). Unconventional shale gas fracking creates a much larger carbon footprint than that of conventional gas, coal, and oil. Emissions from shale oil and gas extraction were approximately 1.5 times higher (about 5.8% ±2.2%) than conventional fracking. Howarth (2015) notes that satellite images gathered over large fracking sites in the US (Eagle Ford, Texas, and Bakken, North Dakota) have shown CH4 rates as high as 9.5% (±7.0%) between 2012 and 2013. From 2006 to 2008 (before there was much unconventional shale fracking), atmospheric CH4 concentrations were much less than they were in 2009–2011 (after shale gas and oil production began in earnest). Applying this same rationale to Vaca Muerta, in 2018, Jorge Daniel Taillant, executive director of the Center for Human Rights and Environment (a nongovernmental organization founded in Argentina and now based in the US), used an infrared camera to analyze whether oil and gas installations in Vaca Muerta were leaking CH4. He found that “‘Methane is leaking everywhere…’ and at least 5 percent of Vaca Muerta gas production is lost, often leaked when pressure needs to be released” (Mander, 2018). Not only is this environmentally hazardous but also CH4 is highly flammable and creates a dangerous work environment. It also is a waste of 5% of the product for which Argentina has invested billions in order to extract. Fracking is a water-intensive process, and water demand in Neuquén has been increasing as fracking has expanded. The amount of water exploited in fracking was approximately zero in 2009 but reached 1.15 × 106 liters per year in
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