This is according to Dr Danie Vermeulen, director of the Institute for Groundwater Studies, at the University of the Free State.
Vermeulen said he was not calling for the moratorium to be lifted at the end of the month but for exploration in the Karoo to be allowed.
“Drilling has to take place to determine if there is enough water in the Karoo for fracking [to be practicable],” Vermeulen told the SA Council for Natural Scientific Professions in Midrand yesterday.
“We can’t [merely] say that we have enough water in the Karoo – we have to prove it.
“We are using outdated figures from the 1970s.”
Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu imposed the moratorium in April; it expires at the end of this month .
Vermeulen, who has studied fracking and visited fracking sites in the US, said: “Even academics in the US differ on the issue.
“Too little is known about fracking and there is so much contradictory information. The public doesn’t know what to believe.”
Vermeulen said it was not known what effect fracking in the Karoo would have on dolerite rock.
“Dolerite is a very hard rock that could leak natural gas. It is not present anywhere else in the world where fracking happens,” he said.
He said the jury was still out on the number of jobs fracking in the Karoo would create.
Economics consultancy Econometrix recently released a report that said fracking in the Karoo could create 300000 to 700000 permanent jobs in the next two decades.
A 2011 report on fracking commissioned by the New York state government said that 12 full-time workers would be needed for each borehole in the first nine years of construction and exploration.
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Article source: http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2012/03/14/fracking-shaky-data-dilemma