Grassroots activists sometimes feel like they’re fighting a losing battle when going up against big industry.

But last week, anti-fracking activists scored a historic victory: They shut down the powerful oil and gas industry’s campaign to bring hydraulic fracturing to New York.

Those activists attribute the surprising outcome to a six-year campaign they say was well-organized. But they also give credit to Sandra Steingraber, a 55-year-old public health biologist whose expertise in fracking research — and generosity — helped boost the cause.

Steingraber’s introduction to fracking was personal.

“I became a cancer patient at age 20," she said. "I was diagnosed with bladder cancer.”

The Illinois native believes her cancer was linked to contaminated drinking water.

That conclusion launched her career as a public-health biologist — a profession that became useful in 2009, when she was living in upstate New York and learned that the gas industry was leasing land in her village to use for fracking.

Steingraber, who is distinguished scholar in residence at Ithaca College, said she set aside all her research projects and turned her full focus to studying fracking.

The term refers to hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting natural gas from shale below the ground. The Southern Tier of New York state has one of the largest shale formations in the nation.

Fracking requires the use of large volumes of water and chemicals under pressure. Environmentalists argue it will cause environmental hazards, but the oil and gas industry have promoted it in New York as a way to create jobs, particularly in the Southern Tier, where the economy is sluggish.

Energy companies and their lobbyists poured millions of dollars into campaign contributions for Gov. Andrew Cuomo and state legislators, trying to convince them that fracking would benefit the state, and that it can be done safely.

Steingraber didn’t have millions to offer. But in 2011, she won a prestigious award from the Heinz Family Foundation for prior research.  

“I decided to take the award money — a hundred-thousand-dollar-check — and use that to found New Yorkers Against Fracking,” she said.

Her seed money helped transform a handful of fledgling anti-fracking groups into an army of more than 300 that included businesses, religious leaders and celebrities like Mark Ruffalo.

They became the voice of the anti-fracking movement. Steingraber used her research expertise to help translate the fracking science into plain English during public hearings.

Last week, her efforts paid off when the Cuomo administration, citing several of the studies about the potential risks of fracking to water and soil, said that it would ban fracking in the state.

Steingraber compared the decision to David beating Goliath, and said she was astonished.

Brad Gill, executive director of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York, said the Cuomo administration bent to pressure from environmental groups. He said fracking has been, and can be, done safely. Roughly 30 other states permit fracking.

The industry has a stellar record, he said, adding he was disappointed..

Cuomo said his decision was based on guidance from his health and environmental commissioners, who he says studied the science.