Penn State Finds Chemical Migration in 3 PA Water Wells from 2010
Media reaction to research findings that trace amounts of chemicals used in Marcellus fracking were found a mile and a half away in three water wells is nearly orgasmic. “Finally! We can shut down this evil, wicked, nasty drilling for fossil fuels!” That’s the unstated (but very clear) reaction from anti-drilling “reporters” at the Associated Press, Bloomberg, StateImpact Pennsylvania and other assorted mainstream media outlets. They do their best to hide all of the pertinent facts in their “reporting.” So MDN is here to set the record straight. First, researchers at Penn State set out to tackle a particularly thorny problem. Back in 2010 (yes, over five years ago) three (yes, only three) property owners near a shale drilling operation reported problems with their drinking water. The researchers, using breakthrough, new “nontraditional” methods have determined that it’s likely (not 100% sure, but reasonably sure) that flowback water that was stored in an open pit leaked out of that pit and hit some underground fractures that allowed the flowback water to travel up to 2 kilometers (1.6 miles) away and contaminate the water wells of those three nearby neighbors. It happened one time, to three water wells, five years ago and was related to a leaky impoundment. Those are the facts. Here’s some of the headlines you’re reading yesterday and today in over 100 major news outlets coast to coast currently bombarding the population with this earth-shattering “news”…
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Apparently torrential rains in Marshall County, WV last week softened up the earth and led to soil shifting and two Williams pipelines rupturing–within hours of each other. One of the pipelines is a 12-inch gathering line that runs from wells in the area to the nearby Fort Beeler processing plant. The other pipeline is a 4-inch condensate pipeline. Condensate spilled out of a hole and into the nearby Little Grave Creek. Cleanup efforts are ongoing. For a short time, five families who live near the 12-inch gathering line were evacuated as a precautionary measure–but they returned home within a few hours…
It’s always a sad day when we report a death related to the Marcellus/Utica industry. Thankfully it doesn’t happen often, but the fact it happens at all is almost too much to bear. We know it’s not realistic to expect no fatalities, but still… On Monday afternoon around 2:30 pm a worker at the former Marcus Hook refinery–which is being converted into a natural gas liquids terminal–was killed after a pylon fell on him. The worker’s name has not yet been released, but it is reported he was in his 50s and from New Jersey and worked for engineering firm AECOM, a contractor working at the site. In a profoundly inappropriate manner, a member of the anti-drilling group Protecting Our Waters jumped on the death as an opportunity to push her anti-drilling message…
Local media in West Virginia is reporting that early Tuesday afternoon a Gastar Exploration worker was injured in an accident at a brine injection well (owned by Gastar) in New Martinsville (Wetzel County), WV. The only thing we know is that the man’s leg was injured. We don’t know his condition or, frankly, many other details. Here’s what we’ve been able to find out so far…
Sometime today, the Appalachia-to-Texas Express (ATEX) ethane pipeline will once again be fully operational. On January 26 a section of the pipeline in Brooke County, WV ruptured and caught fire (see 