Prepare for an onslaught of both information and misinformation intended to soften the resolve of those opposed to fracking in New York. Owing to the recent affirmation of home rule, industry must persuade average New Yorkers, not only elected officials and landowners, that fracking would be good for us.

Some recent examples from the Press & Sun Bulletin:

• The Empire Center has compiled Pennsylvania figures from 2007 to 2011, to indicate that in the early years there is money to be made, per capita. So if a landowner receives a windfall, on average, everyone got a boost. It avoids projecting past 2011. There is no mention of cleanup costs, “water buffalo” expenses, health effects or losses to Pennsylvania’s farming or tourism industries.

• Dan Fitzsimmons, president of the Joint Landowners Coalition, reported that Gary Baker, president of Memorial Hospital in Towanda, “wasn’t aware of any diseases or maladies related to chemical or water contamination as a result (of) hydraulic fracturing” Fitzsimmons concludes this “puts health fears to rest.” No, it doesn’t. Science does not rely on anecdotal evidence. Anyway, there is a gag order in Pennsylvania that prohibits doctors from disclosing such information.

• Brad Gill, executive of The Independent Oil & Gas Association, extols “the superb performance record in other states and the decades-long history of safe oil and gas exploration in New York.” He asserts that New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg “actively supports natural gas usage” before accusing “activist academics and New York City-based special interests” of not being “real experts” able “to determine if expanded natural gas development can be done safely in the Southern Tier. History, experience and science will conclude that (it can)”

I agree. Only based on history, experience and science may we concede fracking is safe. The ongoing health study will be key. To be a credible epidemiological document, it must include substantial data over significant time.

Information about fracking has, from the start, been secretive and selective. From the inability of first responders and doctors to know what is in fracking fluid, to the industries’ exemption from clean air and water standards, to the reported non-disclosure agreements signed before receiving replacement water and the health gag order, there is scant data not provided by industry itself. There is little, so far, to trust.

Meanwhile, life goes on. Almost daily, a new threat to water resources is reported. Clean, fresh water — not gas — is the finite and irreducible basis for life on earth. Frequently, another region comes online with gas resources (this week it was Montana and the Dakotas), where there is gas aplenty with scant risk to groundwater.

Finally, we do not need a “bridge fuel.” We do not have decades to get this right. We require a leap to a sustainable energy model to allow our children and theirs any future at all.

© 2013, Gannett