The potential impact of shale gas development on regional environmental quality include the risk of groundwater pollution during hydraulic fracturing

the risk of surface water pollution due to the backflow drainage

and the influences of methane leakage on regional atmospheric environmental quality. The way of tracking

monitoring and evaluating the environmental quality of shale gas production areas is effective to confirm the effects of pollution prevention measures and understand the long-term cumulative environmental impact. The pollution prevention measures in Nanchuan shale gas production area have been summarized. The groundwater environment

surface water environment

atmospheric environment

acoustic environment

and soil environment in the production area have been monitored. According to the most unfavorable principle

the single factor indexes with the largest monitoring value have been used to evaluate the current environmental quality

and the inter-annual changes of the environmental quality of each element has been assessd. The results show that the monitoring factors of surface water environmental quality

groundwater environmental quality

atmospheric environmental quality

acoustic environmental quality

and soil environmental quality in Nanchuan shale gas production area meet the environmental quality standards of the corresponding functional area.There is no significant inter-annual changes in the evaluation indexes of each monitoring factor

especially the characteristic pollution factor of shale gas development such as chloride. The regional shale gas development has not caused pollution of various environmental elements and significant adverse changes in environmental quality. Although the current pollution prevention measures are effective

the continuous and cumulative environmental impacts still require longer-term follow-up monitoring and evaluation.