Landfills

Indiana County | Industrywide Issues | Lackawanna County | Landfills | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Wastewater

PA DEP Meetings on Injection Well, Marcellus Landfill Expansion
June 1, 2015June 1, 2015

The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) will hold two public meetings, one tonight and one two weeks from tonight, with implications for the Marcellus Shale industry in the state. The first meeting, tonight at 6 pm in Indiana County, will be a question and answer session followed by a public hearing on an application from Pennsylvania General Energy Company (PGE) to convert an old production well into a wastewater injection well. The well is located in Grant Township, Indiana County. The second meeting, on June 15 at 6 pm in Lackawanna County, will consider Keystone Sanitary Landfill’s permit application to expand its facility located in Dunmore and Throop Boroughs. That expansion would mean accepting more waste in general, including Marcellus drill cuttings (leftover rock and dirt from drilling). The details for both meetings…
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Industrywide Issues | Lackawanna County | Landfills | Pennsylvania | Regulation

DEP Still Studying Keystone Landfill Expansion, Plans 2nd Hearing
April 10, 2015April 10, 2015

The third busiest landfill in Pennsylvania is the Keystone Sanitary Landfill, located on the outskirts of Scranton. The Keystone Landfill accepts a great deal of drill cuttings from Marcellus drilling. MDN has chronicled the long fight to first accept, then expand acceptance of drilling waste at the site. Last year Keystone applied for a permit to expand the landfill again–but instead of outward, they want to expand it upward, making it higher, to gain more capacity. At present about 10% of the incoming waste stream at the landfill is shale waste. The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) had, as of last summer, delayed granting the expansion request pending more study (see DEP Delays Scranton Landfill Expansion; Requires Study). In the meantime, Keystone’s base operating permit was up for renewal and earlier this week they got that renewal from the DEP. In the DEP announcement about renewing Keystone’s base permit, they mentioned that a new/second public hearing will soon be held on Keystone’s request to expand upward…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Litigation | Ohio | Regulation | Statewide OH | Wastewater

Anti Groups Sue ODNR to Stop All Frack Waste Disposal in State
March 5, 2015March 5, 2015

With seeming endless supplies of money to file frivolous lawsuits, the virulently anti-drilling and misnamed Food & Water Watch (FWW) along with the so-called FreshWater Accountability Project (FWAP) have, yes, filed yet another lawsuit. Surprise! This time to the two organizations are suing the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) in a case that, if successful, would prevent the ODNR from issuing permits to allow the safe disposal of frack wastewater and drill cuttings. That is, drillers in Ohio (and Pennsylvania, which sends a lot of waste to Ohio for disposal), would have no place to safely dispose fracking wastes, which would (you guessed it) shut down drilling in the Utica and Marcellus…
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About MDN | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | MDN Resources | Wastewater

ShaleNavigator Adds Updated Frack Waste Facilities Layer to Maps
February 25, 2015February 25, 2015

As many MDN readers know, MDN editor Jim Willis partners with Ed Camp from ShaleNavigator, using ShaleNavigator’s top-notch mapping software to create the marvelous maps found in the Marcellus and Utica Shale Databook series. Ed maps the most recent round of permits issued (over the previous four months) on county maps, showing driller name and location for each volume of the Databook. But the maps show a lot more than just permit locations–like major natural gas pipelines, the locations of compressor stations and over a dozen other “layers” available to users of the ShaleNavigator service.

You can now add one more updated layer to the service: the location of frack waste facilities used by Marcellus and Utica Shale drillers. The most recent volume of the 2014 Databook, Volume 3, contains that very information: a complete list (with addresses and phone numbers) for frack waste facilities. Ed has used the location data for those waste facilities compiled for the Databook and has added the updated layer for users of his excellent service. The press release is below. Be sure to give ShaleNavigator a try by signing up for a free 7-day trial account…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA | Wastewater

PA Dem Congressman “Steps Up” Frack Waste Witch Hunt
February 17, 2015February 17, 2015

Pennsylvania Congressman Matt Cartwright, an anti-drilling Democrat from northeast PA, began a bash-shale-drilling meme late last year (see PA Dem Congressman Demands Info from DEP on Frack Waste and PA Dem Congressman Cartwright Continues to Bash DEP). Cartwright wants to violate the U.S. Constitution and remove individual states rights to regulate oil and gas drilling and instead concentrate that power in Washington, D.C. where people like the arrogant Cartwright can control it via fiat. Cartwright is at it again. He’s “stepped up” his so-called investigation into shale waste disposal. The AP recently visited with Cartwright to take dictation…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | New York | Research | Statewide NY

Anti-Drillers Try to Ban Drill Cuttings from PA in NY Landfills
February 9, 2015February 9, 2015

The anti-drilling group Environmental Advocates of New York has just published a 24-page “report” that claims drill cuttings–leftover rock and dirt from drilling a hole in the ground–that are being landfilled in New York State are radioactive and will make us New Yorkers all glow in the dark. Any day now. The report is titled “License to Dump” (full copy embedded below). Since anti-drillers successfully cowed the impotent Gov. Andrew Cuomo once, well, it ought to work again, right? Ban those drill cuttings Andy! Right now!! This is 24 pages of “notoriously toxic and radioactive” garbage…
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Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

PA DEP Looks Ahead 1,000 Yrs, Changes Landfill Rules for Cuttings
February 3, 2015February 3, 2015

Citing concerns over radon, the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection “quietly” change the rules on Marcellus drillers near the end of last year with respect to disposing of shale cuttings at landfills. Starting on Jan. 1 of this year, landfills must move to a monthly, instead of annual, limit on how much “radioactive waste” they accept from drillers in the form of cuttings (leftover rock and dirt). The new standard is calculated so that a person living 1,000 years from now in a house built on the landfill would not be exposed to levels of radiation over what is considered safe today. Nice to know the DEP is always thinking ahead, a thousand years…
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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA | Wastewater

PA DEP Completes Fracking Radiation Study, Concludes “Little Harm”
January 16, 2015January 16, 2015

We love it when we get to close a loop–especially this one. Exactly two years ago the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection, under then Secretary Mike Krancer, embarked on what would become a two-year, top to bottom, “thorough and rigorous” study of radiation in shale drilling (see PA DEP Announces New Study of Radiation in Shale Drilling). That is, they would use real science to figure out whether we will all, as the anti-drillers claim, begin to glow in the dark from exposure to radiation in wastewater, radiation in drill cuttings and radiation in “fracked gas” as they frequently prattle on about. The 200-page study is complete and we have a copy (below). What did the DEP conclude in their “peer reviewed” study? “There is little potential for harm to workers or the public from radiation exposure due to oil and gas development.” That is, the DEP says all of these wild-eyed claims of radiation poisoning are false…
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Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Litigation | Luzerne County | Pennsylvania

Hazleton, PA Drill Cuttings Project Opposed by Competitors, Enviros
January 12, 2015January 12, 2015

On Dec. 1, MDN told you about a cool idea: Use non-toxic, non-polluting shale cuttings (leftover rock and dirt that comes out of a borehole when a well is drilled) to reclaim former coal mining land that sits barren now, so the land can host businesses and even a huge outdoor amphitheater (see Shale Cuttings Used to Rehab Site of Future Business, Amphitheater). That’s the idea of Hazleton Creek Properties (HCP) for reclaiming a 270-acre site with abandoned coal mines and an old landfill on the edge of Hazleton, PA. Local “environmentalists” from a nutty-sounding group called SUFFER (Save Us From Future Environmental Risks) used a Philadelphia law firm to oppose the original “demonstration” project, settling in 2012 (see this background the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia). SUFFER is still suffering from FDS (Fracking Derangement Syndrome) and is critical of the new plan, approved last November by the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). However, in a strange twist, it’s not SUFFER that’s challenging the plan, but instead it’s competitors that belong to the Pennsylvania Waste Industries Association–other landfills that presumably want the cuttings that would go to Hazleton. The Association, on behalf of their members, have filed an appeal of the DEP decision that allows the cuttings to be used in Hazleton. It appears the other landfills are trying to stop the cuttings that presumably now go to their own landfills from slipping away to Hazleton…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Monroe County | Pennsylvania | Wastewater

League of Women Voters Questions New PA Reps on Fracking
January 12, 2015January 12, 2015

Too funny. The League of [Liberal Democrat and Anti-Drilling] Women Voters held their annual beat-up-on-Republicans, er, a, “legislative coffee” with newly minted state representatives on Saturday at the Hughes Library in Stroudsburg (Monroe County), PA. All of the questions were, apparently, asked by the moderator of the event, the liberal Democrat editor of the Pocono Record, Paula Heeschen. On the hot seat were two newly elected Republicans to the PA House: Rep. David Parker, R-115, and Rep. Jack Rader, R-176. Heeschen tried her best to bait the pair with patently loaded and in many cases questions with false premises, like this one about fracking…
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Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Luzerne County | Pennsylvania | Soil

Shale Cuttings Used to Rehab Site of Future Business, Amphitheater
December 1, 2014December 1, 2014

A story from Hazelton, PA totally refutes the argument that drill cuttings (leftover rock and dirt from shale drilling) are radioactive and will make you glow in the dark–a claim frequently made by anti-drillers. The scars of coal mining dot the landscape in northeastern PA. In one such area, on the edge of Hazelton, sits a 270-acre site with abandoned mines and an old landfill. The location, known as Hazelton Creek Properties, is in the process of reclaiming part of the site by using (yes) drill cuttings. The site will eventually host an amphitheater for concerts and other businesses. People will one day be sitting directly over top of shale cuttings!…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA | Wastewater

PA Dem Congressman Cartwright Continues to Bash DEP
November 21, 2014November 21, 2014

An anti-drilling Democrat Congressman from Pennsylvania’s 17th Congressional District (eastern part of the state), U.S. Rep. Matt Cartwright, continues a campaign of smearing the Marcellus Shale industry with a so-called investigation into how frack wastes in PA get handled and disposed. In October Cartwright demanded information from the new acting Secretary of the Dept. of Environmental Protection (see PA Dem Congressman Demands Info from DEP on Frack Waste). Cartwright’s latest media stunt is to send demand letters to WV and OH to ask them how they dispose frack waste in their states…
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Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Ohio | Regulation | Statewide OH

OH Regulators Issue Guidance to Landfills on Accepting Frack Waste
November 20, 2014November 20, 2014

Three days ago the Ohio EPA, the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources’ (ODNR) Division of Oil and Gas Resources Management, and the Ohio Department of Health issued a joint 4-page “guidance letter” to landfills in Ohio that clarifies how and when they can dispose liquid and solid waste from oil and gas drilling (full copy embedded below). According to our friends at the Babst Calland law firm, “The letter addresses what waste is defined as solid waste that must be disposed in landfills, classification of certain drill cuttings as not constituting regulated solid waste, and substances classified as TENORM that must be analyzed for radioactivity prior to landfill disposal.” Ohio landfill operators and Ohio drillers will need to pay attention to these new guidelines, some of which recently went into effect…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Litigation | Ohio | Regulation | Statewide OH | Wastewater

Another Day, Another Lawsuit from Food & Water Watch
November 20, 2014November 20, 2014

The anti-drilling Fresh Water Accountability Project (FWAP)–based in Ohio–along with the odious and litigious (and misnamed) Food & Water Watch have once again, sued. Surprise! This time they’ve sued OH Gov. John Kasich along with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) for what they claim are the “illegal approval of at least 23 fracking waste handling, storage, processing and recycling facilities to operate.” Lea Harper, head of the so-called FWAP, has been involved in other anti-drilling lawsuits, including one against the Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District. FWW must have to employ a librarian to keep track of all their anti-drilling lawsuits. Here’s the latest bald-faced lies from these two litigious organizations:
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Industrywide Issues | Lackawanna County | Landfills | Pennsylvania

Scranton Newspaper Takes Another Swipe at Local Landfill/Cuttings
November 17, 2014November 17, 2014

This past summer MDN brought you the story of Keystone Sanitary Landfill and their request to expand the landfill skyward (see DEP Delays Scranton Landfill Expansion; Requires Study). Keystone Landfill, on the outskirts of Scranton, PA, is the state’s third busiest landfill. They accept a lot of Marcellus drill cuttings (leftover rock and dirt). A consultant for Keystone, Albert Magnotta, recently told Scranton’s ~~anti-drilling rag~~ the Times-Tribune that residents from the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre area will run out of places to dump their trash in five years if Keystone is not allowed to expand. So the Times-Tribune found another landfill not too far away, Alliance Sanitary Landfill in Taylor, PA–owned by the country’s largest garbage collection/dumping service (Waste Management)–to dispute Keystone’s claim. The Times-Tribune would love nothing better than to close down Keystone (a privately-owned local company) and their ability to accept drill cuttings, by assisting a nationally-owned competitor…
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Brooke County | Harrison County | Industrywide Issues | Landfills | Ohio County | Regulation | Statewide WV | West Virginia | Wetzel County | Wood County

Radiation Detectors for Drill Cuttings Installed at 6 WV Landfills
October 31, 2014October 31, 2014

Earlier this year the West Virginia legislature, in special session, passed a bill (HB 4411) that Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin signed into law that establishes certain regulations to allow WV landfills to accept drill cuttings (leftover rock and dirt) from Marcellus and Utica Shale drilling. One of the provisions in the bill is that landfills with special, set-aside “cells” for larger volumes of drill cuttings be equipped with radiation detectors (see WV Drill Cuttings in Landfill Bill Passes in Record Time). Work on installing those detectors at six landfills is almost complete. The detectors are (or will be) installed at two sites in Harrison County, and one site each in Brooke, Ohio, Wetzel and Wood counties. How will it work?…
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