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Anti-Drillers Try to Ban Drill Cuttings from PA in NY Landfills

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

In the Year 2525Citing 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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PA DEP Completes Fracking Radiation Study, Concludes “Little Harm”

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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Hazleton, PA Drill Cuttings Project Opposed by Competitors, Enviros

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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League of Women Voters Questions New PA Reps on Fracking

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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Shale Cuttings Used to Rehab Site of Future Business, Amphitheater

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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PA Dem Congressman Cartwright Continues to Bash DEP

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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OH Regulators Issue Guidance to Landfills on Accepting Frack Waste

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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Another Day, Another Lawsuit from Food & Water Watch

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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Scranton Newspaper Takes Another Swipe at Local Landfill/Cuttings

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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Radiation Detectors for Drill Cuttings Installed at 6 WV Landfills

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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PA Dem Congressman Demands Info from DEP on Frack Waste

An anti-drilling Pennsylvania Democrat Congressman, Matt Cartwright, believes Washington, DC and not the individual states should be the ones regulating shale oil and gas drilling. So Cartwright, under the pretense of seeking information, has sent a letter to the acting Secretary of the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) seeking information on how the state oversees frack waste disposal (wastewater and drill cuttings). Cartwright is the just the latest PA Democrat to bash away at the single industry keeping the PA economy out of the economic crapper. Cartwright, in his letter, refers to the flawed “report” from another high profile PA Dem who is critical of the industry, state Auditor General Eugene DePasquale (see Anti-Drilling PA Auditor General Criticizes DEP in “Report”)…
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WV Legislature Closes Loophole for Drill Cuttings in Landfills

Earlier this year, the West Virginia legislature passed a bill allowing the state’s landfills to create a special cell with special monitoring to accept shale cuttings–leftover rock and dirt–as much as they want and can handle (see WV Drill Cuttings in Landfill Bill Passes in Record Time). That is, with one important exception: The new law disallows a special cell for drill cuttings to be built in landfills that sit over top a “karst” topography (where there are a lot of underground caves, sinkholes, cracks and fast-moving underground streams). However, there was a loophole, an oversight, in the new law: If landfills above a karst topography area are happy with maintaining their current lower cap of 9,999 tons per day of solid waste, they can accept shale drill cuttings in the regular part of the landfill (see Loophole in WV Landfill Law for Drill Cuttings Raises Concern). Oops. The loophole has now been closed…
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NY Anti Drillers Apoplectic Over Soil in Chemung Co. Landfill

X-Files The Truth is Out ThereA bunch of former hippies who are now anti-drilling activists in the Twin Tiers area of New York (Elmira/Corning area) protested at the Chemung County legislature meeting last night. Protesting what? That the Chemung County landfill, which has been accepting drill cuttings from PA shale drilling for something like two years now, is considering expanding the landfill to make more money from PA’s drillers. Accepting drill cuttings is the only way New Yorkers currently make money from the shale drilling revolution (thank you Gov. Ditherer). Once again protesters are claiming area residents will start glowing in the dark–any time now…
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SWPA Drillers Seriously Underreport Drill Cuttings at Landfills

We’re not quite sure what to make of this story. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which has trended anti-drilling in recent months, has an article that claims both EQT and Range Resources, among the largest of Marcellus drillers, are underreporting the volume of drill cuttings they send to area landfills in southwest Pennsylvania. EQT is by far the biggest “offender” in the PPG article. According to documents filed with the state Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), EQT estimates it sent 21 tons of drill cuttings to landfills in 2013. According to hard copy records from six landfills in SWPA, EQT actually sent 95,000 tons of drill cuttings! Yikes, that’s quite a discrepancy…
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PA Marcellus Sludge with Low Radiation Heading to Michigan

In May MDN told you about a tank at a Range Resources’ Carter wastewater impoundment in Mt. Pleasant Township (Washington County), PA that was found to have low levels of radiation. Although the level of radiation in the tank is barley above “background levels,” it’s high enough that it must be properly disposed of (see Low Levels of Radiation Found in Range PA Wastewater Impoundment). Apparently the tank, used to separate wastewater from sludge, is a really big tank. So big (heavy) it can’t be easily or safely moved along highways. So Range transferred the material in the big tank into two smaller tanks. Those tanks will soon be on their way for permanent disposal in…Michigan?
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