Under the Surface: Fracking, Fortunes, and the Fate of the Marcellus Shale

For the paperback edition, Wilber has written a new chapter and epilogue covering developments since the book's initial publication in 2012. Chief among these are the home rule movement and accompanying social and legal events leading up to an unprecedented ban of fracking in New York state, and the outcome of the federal EPA's investigation of water pollution just across the state border in Dimock, Pennsylvania.

The industry, with powerful political allies, effectively challenged the federal government's attempts to intervene in drilling communities in Pennsylvania, Wyoming, and Texas with water problems. But it met its match in a grassroots movement—known as "fractivism"—that sprouted from seeds sown in upstate New York community halls and grew into one of the state's most influential environmental movements since Love Canal.

Throughout the book, Wilber illustrates otherwise dense policy and legal issues in human terms and shows how ordinary people can affect extraordinary events.