She claims a thousand gas wells a year would use as much water as two cities the size of Fredericton which raises the question what effect that would have on rivers, lakes and streams where it's taken from.
As for waterless fracking which uses carbon dioxide and liquified propane gas, Merrill says the big barrier to that would be economics and how much it would cost companies to use that technology.
She isn't holding out much hope that regulations to be unveiled soon by the Alward Government will safeguard the environment because they haven't anywhere else.
