Wastewater

Accidents | Energy Companies | EQT Corp | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Tioga County (PA) | Wastewater

PA DEP Levies Biggest Fine Ever, $4.5M Against EQT
October 8, 2014October 8, 2014

We’ve got some bad blood happening between EQT–a big Marcellus driller headquartered in Pittsburgh, PA–and the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). The DEP has just filed a lawsuit against EQT to force the company to cough up a new record–$4.53 million in fines–for a leaky wastewater impoundment in Tioga County, PA. The fine comes a week after the anti-drilling PA Attorney General, Kathleen Kane, once again abused her office’s powers by filing criminal charges against EQT (see today’s companion story). The DEP says EQT filed for and received permission to build a freshwater impoundment at that location in 2012, but after the impoudment was built, they decided to change and use it for frack wastewater. Problem is, with a wastewater impoundment you need monitoring wells drilled around the impoundment and extra protections that were lacking because it was supposed to be used for freshwater only. EQT then built a second impoundment next to it for wastewater and did install monitoring wells, figuring those monitoring wells would cover both impoundments. The first impoundment leaked and, according to the DEP, EQT just doesn’t get how serious the problems were/are that resulted, and so they’ve slapped them with their biggest single fine ever. EQT is already fighting back both legally and with their own press release…
Read More “PA DEP Levies Biggest Fine Ever, $4.5M Against EQT”
Accidents | Energy Companies | EQT Corp | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Tioga County (PA) | Wastewater

PA Attorney Gen. Kane Abuses Office Again, Arrest Warrant for EQT
October 8, 2014October 8, 2014

Last year Pennsylvania’s anti-drilling Attorney General, Kathleen Kane, abused her office and filed criminal charges against XTO Energy over a spill of fracking wastewater at a site in Lycoming County, PA that happened more than three years ago–long before she took office (see PA AG Abuses Her Authority, Files Criminal Charges Against XTO). In a Britney Spears “Oops!…I Did It Again” moment, Kane has filed a second case of criminal charges against a driller over an accident. Last week Kane filed charges against EQT over a leaky wastewater impoundment in Tioga County, PA. Yesterday the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection fined EQT $4.53 million–it’s highest ever fine–over the same incident (see today’s lead story). Kane is claiming that EQT polluted and disturbed PA waterways and committed misdemeanor crimes in the process…
Read More “PA Attorney Gen. Kane Abuses Office Again, Arrest Warrant for EQT”
Antero Resources | Energy Companies | Harrison County | Industrywide Issues | Wastewater | West Virginia

Antero’s Frack Wastewater Cleaned/Recycled by WV Startup
October 7, 2014October 7, 2014

Chance Richie is a former officer on a U.S. nuclear submarine and the CEO and founder of Shalewater Solutions–a company started in 2011 that cleans and recycles frack wastewater in the Marcellus and Utica Shale. Richie’s company, located in Harrison County, WV, has landed one of the biggest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica–Antero Resources. The key to Shalewater’s approach is the fact that all wastewater is not the same. The chemical composition changes from driller to driller, site to site, and shale play to shale play…
Read More “Antero’s Frack Wastewater Cleaned/Recycled by WV Startup”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Summit County | Wastewater

Anti-Drillers Protest 2 RINO Governors at Fundraiser in OH
October 7, 2014October 7, 2014

So two RINO governors walk into a fundraiser…. It may sound like the setup for a political joke, but there was no joking when Ohio Gov. John Kasich and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie both attended the Summit County, OH GOP fundraising dinner on Sept. 29th. Protesters met the RINOs as they walked in–to complain about (yes) shale drilling and using fossil fuels. Agitated and backed by the odious Food & Water Watch, along with the Network for Oil and Gas Accountability and Protection (NEOGAP) and FaCT (Faith Communities Together for fracking awareness), the protesters on that day were specifically complaining about frack wastewater and Class II injection wells…
Read More “Anti-Drillers Protest 2 RINO Governors at Fundraiser in OH”
Accidents | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Range Resources Corp | Regulation | Washington County | Wastewater

Hearing on Range Yeager Impoundment/Water Contamination Continues
October 6, 2014October 6, 2014

More from the ongoing hearing into the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection’s actions, or lack of actions, in determining a private water well 2,800 feel (half a mile) downhill from a Range Resources wastewater impoundment that was found to be leaky was fouled by that impoundment. We previously explained that in order for a lawsuit by the landowner Loren Kiskadden against Range for “contaminating” his water well to be valid, the DEP must reverse a previous finding that Range’s Yeager impoundment did not foul his well (see Did DEP Mishandle Range Wastewater Impoundment Investigation?). So one of the DEP’s investigators has been on the hot seat explaining his previous findings and reports…
Read More “Hearing on Range Yeager Impoundment/Water Contamination Continues”
Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA | Wastewater

PA DEP Sec. Abruzzo’s Last Public Interview…with MDN
October 3, 2014October 3, 2014

Sadly, Pennsylvania’s Sec. of the Dept. of Environmental Protection, Christopher Abruzzo, resigned yesterday. See our lead story today for the details. Below is a podcast/recording of what MDN believes is Abruzzo’s last publicly recorded interview before he resigned–an interview with MDN editor Jim Willis. The interview was conducted at the Shale Insight event on Wednesday, Sept. 24 at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh. It was one day later, on Sept. 25, that news broke of five year-old emails, passed between Abruzzo and friends, that allegedly contained pornographic images. The issue triggered Abruzzo’s resignation yesterday. Regardless of his departure, Jim’s interview concerned important issues for the environment and the drilling industry in PA. Here’s the tough issues Jim tackled during the interview…
Read More “PA DEP Sec. Abruzzo’s Last Public Interview…with MDN”
Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide OH | Statewide PA | Wastewater

GAO Issues Report on Class II Injection Well Fluid Info Collection
September 30, 2014September 30, 2014

Several anti-drilling U.S. senators and congressman requested that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) conduct research and issue a report to describe what information the federal EPA and the individual states collect from class II injection well operators on the characteristics of injected fluids. That is, the Dems wanted the GAO to write a book report on just how nasty and vile the chemicals are from oil and gas drilling that get injected deep into the earth, never to return, and how those nasty chemicals may one day pollute all of our drinking water supplies. The Democrat staffers at the GAO were only too happy to comply. Both Pennsylvania and Ohio’s programs are part of the “study”…
Read More “GAO Issues Report on Class II Injection Well Fluid Info Collection”
Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Range Resources Corp | Regulation | Washington County | Wastewater

Did DEP Mishandle Range Wastewater Impoundment Investigation?
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Range Resources has had a long-running dispute with some of the neighbors near some of it’s wastewater impoundments in Washington, PA. Without recounting the details (see MDN’s previous stories here), the entire thing came to a head recently when the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) completed their investigation and fined Range the highest amount any driller has paid so far in the modern shale drilling era (see PA DEP Fines Range Resources $4.15M for Wastewater Impoundments). Part of the deal is that Range is closing those impoundments. There are, of course, legal actions involved, as you might expect. One of the neighbors near the Yeager impoundment sued Range with claims of well water contamination from chemicals leaking from the impoundment. The DEP determined the landowner’s well was not contaminated by the Range impoundment and the landowner challenged that finding in DEP’s version of court, the Environmental Hearing Board. Testimony at the hearing last week from a DEP official about the investigation indicates the DEP “might have used incomplete and inaccurate test information to decide whether chemicals leaking…contaminated a water well and springs”…
Read More “Did DEP Mishandle Range Wastewater Impoundment Investigation?”
Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA | Wastewater

Stanford Study Tells Us What We Knew 3 Years Ago About Wastewater
September 24, 2014September 24, 2014

A new research study from Stanford University titled “Enhanced Formation of Disinfection By-Products in Shale Gas Wastewater-Impacted Drinking Water Supplies” proves what we already knew more than three years ago: When you send frack wastewater untreated, or lightly treated, to a municipal sewage treatment plant–the plant can’t get the residual water clean enough to not cause problems down river. Back in 2011, then-PA DEP Sec. Michael Krancer ended the practice of municipal treatment plants without special equipment from processing frack wastewater (see PA DEP, Marcellus Shale Coalition Admit Drilling Wastewater Likely Contaminating Drinking Water). Not long after it was shown that bromide levels–one of the hazards of treating frack wastewater with chlorine–had fallen after the ban (see Marcellus Wastewater Ban Leads to Lower Bromide in PA Rivers). Here we are three years later and a new study says the same thing…
Read More “Stanford Study Tells Us What We Knew 3 Years Ago About Wastewater”
Columbiana County | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Trucking | Wastewater

Frack Truck Washing Facility Shut Down Until ODNR Permit Issued
September 23, 2014September 23, 2014

Clear Creek is a division of Dynamic Structures Inc., a company based in New Waterford (Columbiana County), OH that hauls drilling mud, fresh water and yes, frack wastewater for oil and gas companies throughout Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Clear Creek had constructed a truck washing facility in the city of Columbiana–population 6,384–to clean the trucks that haul the mud and wastewater. Columbiana’s planning commission has shut down the facility until they obtain a permit from the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR). Once that happens, it appears they can reopen. The problem is, the Mayor of Columbiana lives nearby to where the facility is located and he opposes it. Oops…
Read More “Frack Truck Washing Facility Shut Down Until ODNR Permit Issued”
Energy Services | GreenHunter Resources | Industrywide Issues | Meigs County | Ohio | Wastewater

GreenHunter Gets Green Light for 4 New OH Injection Wells
September 18, 2014September 18, 2014

This one won’t please the anti-drilling nutters in Ohio. GreenHunter Resources (division of Magnum Hunter) announced on Tuesday they have received permits and have concluded successful testing to bring four new Utica/Marcellus wastewater injection wells online in Meigs County, OH. With the addition of these four new injection wells, GreenHunter will be operating a total of 13 such wells. Each of the new wells can handle 3,000-5,000 barrels of brine/wastewater per day. According to GreenHunter, most of that new capacity coming online is already spoken for. They already have major drillers locked up as customers for the new capacity because the need is so great. The company also says the wells are ready to be begin accepting wastewater that’s barged down the Ohio River (hint hint U.S. Coast Guard)…
Read More “GreenHunter Gets Green Light for 4 New OH Injection Wells”
Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Warren County | Wastewater

CWA v Waste Treatment Corp Wastewater Discharge Lawsuit Settled
September 12, 2014September 12, 2014

In October of last year MDN told you the radical national anti-drilling organization Clean Water Action (CWA) had sued a small Pennsylvania company by the name of Waste Treatment Corporation (WTC) in Warren, PA in federal court claiming the company continued to accept, treat and discharge Marcellus drilling wastewater into the Allegheny River (see CWA Sues/Accuses Waste Treatment Corp of Continued Shale Pollution). WTC was supposed to have stopped that practice two years earlier, in 2011, after then-Secretary of the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), Michael Krancer, got all such operations to cease and desist. Responses to the CWA lawsuit from both the WTC and the DEP raised more questions than they answered for us (see Waste Treatment, PA DEP Respond to CWA Lawsuit). Since last year, the lawsuit has been quiet–at least publicly. Yesterday CWA announced they’ve reached a settlement of the case with WTC agreeing to immediately stop accepting/discharging Marcellus wastewater (even though they say they don’t), install expensive new equipment over the next 8 months, and then restart accepting Marcellus wastewater processing again…
Read More “CWA v Waste Treatment Corp Wastewater Discharge Lawsuit Settled”
American Water Management | Earthquakes | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Trumbull County | Wastewater

ODNR Temporarily Shuts Down Injection Wells After Low-Level Quake
September 8, 2014September 8, 2014

On Sunday, August 31 at 5:45 pm, there was an earthquake in the vicinity of Weathersfield (Trumbull County), OH. However, no one felt it. The only way anyone knew there was a quake was because of monitoring by the U.S. Geological Survey. The Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) is investigating whether or not two wastewater injection wells, operated by American Water Management Services (AWMS), was the cause of that low-level quake that no one felt. According to the ODNR, from an “abundance of caution” they asked AWMS to shut down operations at those two wells while they investigate, which has now been done…
Read More “ODNR Temporarily Shuts Down Injection Wells After Low-Level Quake”
Allegheny County | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Venango County | Wastewater

PA Driller Slapped with $250K Fine for Dumping Brine, Erosion
August 27, 2014August 27, 2014

UPDATE: An alert MDN reader from Venango County with industry knowledge contacted MDN to say he very much doubts Henderson has done any Marcellus Shale drilling. Henderson’s history is as a shallow/conventional driller and not a shale driller. Thanks for that clarification!

William Henderson, the president and operator of three companies–Titusville Oil & Gas Associates Inc., Eagle Line Corporation, and Olympia Oil Services Inc.–has been fined $250,000 by the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) for violations of the Clean Stream Law, Solid Waste Management Act, and Oil and Gas Act. The DEP says Henderson and his companies have caused environmental damage from illegal discharges of production fluids (brine), for causing erosion, and more. The violations occurred from 2010 to 2014. It’s not clear to MDN that any of the violations were from Marcellus Shale drilling activities, but it seems likely. Here’s what the DEP said, along with information not provided by the DEP that MDN has dug up on Henderson from 2011…
Read More “PA Driller Slapped with $250K Fine for Dumping Brine, Erosion”
Accidents | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Wastewater | Westmoreland County | WPX Energy

DEP Says WPX Needs to Replace 3rd Water Supply in SW PA
August 27, 2014August 27, 2014

In July, MDN told you the water wells for two of three families living near a WPX recycled frack wastewater impoundment (i.e. “pond”), near Ligonier (Westmoreland County), PA, were determined to have been contaminated by that impoundment. That is, the Kalp impoundment leaked into the ground, according to the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), and that has caused a long-term problem with those wells (see WPX Wastewater Impoundment Source of Water Contamination in W PA? and our follow-up story Important Update on WPX Energy Leaking Impoundment in SWPA). The DEP has made a final determination that the third family’s well, the elderly Ken and Mildred Geary, was also affected and that WPX will need to find a permanent water replacement solution for them too…
Read More “DEP Says WPX Needs to Replace 3rd Water Supply in SW PA”
Energy Services | GreenHunter Resources | Industrywide Issues | Marshall County | Pipelines | Processing Plants | Wastewater | West Virginia

Mystery Solved: GreenHunter Pipelines to Terminate Near…
August 27, 2014August 27, 2014

Now that U.S. Coast Guard’s comment period for barging frack wastewater is officially closed and a positive decision to move forward is likely, we expect to see more movement from GreenHunter Water on building out their barge facility near Wheeling, WV. As part of GreenHunter’s master plan, the company announced at the end of June that they will build three new (short) pipelines, one each dedicated to brine/wastewater, fresh water, and condensate (see 3 New (Short) Pipelines from GreenHunter in Tri-state Area). The three pipelines will all terminate in the same location–but until now, GreenHunter has been cagey about where (see GreenHunter’s Unidentified Barge Facility Pipeline Destination). We said at the time the betting money is on GreenHunter’s facility in Wheeling. Were we right?…
Read More “Mystery Solved: GreenHunter Pipelines to Terminate Near…”