Texas, North Dakota Driving U.S. Oil Boom

The U.S. is in the middle of a huge oil and natural gas boom, with crude oil production heading skyward fast thanks to a drilling rush in two states — Texas and North Dakota.

Newly released Energy Information Administration data show just how fast that rise is occurring and why: thanks to hydraulic fracturing drilling technology opening up vast deposits of crude beneath North Dakota and Texas, those states are almost solely responsible for the meteoric rise in oil production in the U.S. since 2010.

And that means greenhouse gas emissions in those states are spiking, too, with little sign of slowing.  That’s happening even as the Obama administration has rolled out major proposals to slash emissions related to two of the other major sources of greenhouse gases in the U.S. — coal-fired power plants and landfills.

Texas, North Dakota Driving U.S. Oil Boom