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A fracking company based in Western Pennsylvania has strayed from convention and started naming their wells after superheroes

Well names don't typically make the news, they're usually named after the family that leases the property.

But Rice Energy wants their wells to conjure images of Batman and Robin, the Hulk, and most interestingly Captain Planet. In case you're not familiar with this early 90's superhero, IMDB sums the show up as, “A quintet of teenagers work together to encourage environmentally responsible behavior and can summon a superhero to deal with ecological disasters.”

Exactly how you would imagine a fracking well, right?

Not so much.

That's why we launched a name-that-well contest on Facebook! If fracking wells are going to be named after super-anything it's supervillains.

So, take a crack at it! What do you think wells should be named?

You can vote for the most creative name by 'liking' comments on Facebook or up-voting comments on this blog.

A sampling from the Facebook contest so far:

  • Kommunity Killer
  • Dick “the devil” Cheney
  • Frackdemort
  • North Deathkota
  • Apep, the deification of darkness and chaos from the Egyptian Pantheon.

Being a fracktivist can be a full time job. It's certainly not easy, especially if you have another full time job to pay the bills. And it's usually not fun, especially if you were forced into it by circumstance.

So let's take our laughs when we can get them and make a game of this latest bit of fracking industry ridiculousness. But as one Facebook commenter said, the first choice is “Don't name them. Get rid of them instead.”

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