The Hill News

Conventional wisdom tells us that the U.S. oil-and-gas boom is a welcomed turn of events â€" especially in the Midwest’s heavily industrialized and economically struggling Rust Belt states, tight shale oil and gas appear to be new varieties of precious black gold.

In Ohio and its neighboring states, residents have suffered through decades of downturn. The region’s specialization in processing raw materials for manufacturing had faded away. Prosperity is now returning, though slowly, to the Midwest economy in the form of resources buried deeply in the disconnected fissures of the Utica, Marcellus and Devonian shale. Conventional thinking is unlikely to question the wisdom of this energy windfall.

Unconventional thinking, however, raises red flags in the conventional wisdom. Will the U.S. oil-and-gas boom bolster energy and economic security? Maybe. But there are risks.

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