Pennsylvania law on fracking worries doctors
www.pennlive.com/newsflash/index.ssf/story/pennsylvania-law-on-fracking-worries-doctors/dd15e865ab528519210b827575117d4f
April 25, 2012, 8:14 a.m. EDT
McClatchy/Tribune – MCT Information Services
AVELLA, Pa. _ About two years ago, Dr. Amy Pare began treating members of the Moten family and their neighbors from a working-class neighborhood less than half a mile from a natural gas well here.
A plastic surgeon whose specialty includes skin cancer, Pare removed and biopsied quarter-size skin lesions from Jeannie Moten, 53, and her niece, only to find that the sores recurred. “The good news is that it wasn’t cancer, and the bad news is that we have no idea what it is,” Pare said.
Determined to understand the illnesses, Pare went last May to the Motens’ neighborhood to collect urine samples from a dozen people. To her dismay, she found chemicals not normally present in the human body: hippuric acid, phenol, mandelic acid.
The Motens and their neighbors suspect their ailments could be tied to the natural gas well. Pare says she is not sure what is causing their problems. But she worries that she may have a hard time determining the exact cause because of a provision in a new Pennsylvania law regulating natural gas production.
The law compels natural gas companies to give inquiring health care professionals information about the chemicals used in their drilling and production processes _ but only after the doctors or nurses sign a confidentiality agreement.
Some physicians complain that the law is vague and lacks specific guidelines about how they can use and share the information with patients, colleagues and public health officials, putting them at risk of violating the measure. But refusing to sign the confidentiality agreement denies them access to information that could help treat patients.
“I just want to make my patients healthy,” Pare said, adding that she might sign an agreement. “And I can’t do that if I don’t know what it is that’s making them sick.”
The possibility that increased natural gas development could threaten public heath lies at the core of resistance to a controversial process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The technique involves high-pressure injection of water and sand laced with chemicals deep underground to break shale formations and unlock oil and gas deposits.
Some people living near well sites have complained that their well water has been contaminated by fracking. The industry asserts that tiny amounts of chemicals are used in fracking and that the water problems are unrelated to the procedure.
Supporters of the Pennsylvania law _ including the gas industry, Republican Gov. Tom Corbett and many legislators _ said it was designed to help health care providers. Environmental groups and opposing lawmakers said the provision was not in the natural gas law’s original version and was slipped in behind closed doors at the last minute by industry-friendly legislators.
Patrick Henderson, the governor’s energy executive, said the new law would increase disclosure. Companies would have to share the chemical composition of fluids they use in natural gas production, including proprietary mixes. The confidentiality agreement would not prevent doctors from sharing information with colleagues or patients, only with the company’s competitors, he said.
Dr. Marilyn Heine, president of the Pennsylvania Medical Society, said her group had been assured by the state that as regulations are developed to implement the law, state officials “will clarify the provisions so that physicians will know what they can do.”
Some doctors, however, want the details in writing before they sign any confidentiality agreements.
“Right now, any physician reading the law would not go anywhere near the issue, because the language of the law has a very chilling effect,” said Dr. Bernard Goldstein, former dean of the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health and an expert on possible health effects of natural gas development. “I very much hope that the regulations permit” information sharing, he added.
So far, there are no comprehensive, independent studies of the possible health effects of natural gas development.
Dr. Sean Porbin, a family practitioner in Avella, thinks natural gas development could revive many struggling towns in Pennsylvania. “We need to ask questions,” he said. “It’s not about shutting down industry, but fixing it. And if the data show what they’re doing is safe, then we need to defend them.”
Pennsylvania’s new law is not unprecedented, according to the state’s Republican leadership, the natural gas industry and at least two prominent environmental groups. The measure is based on a new rule in Colorado and on two decades-old federal laws from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Health and Safety Administration.
The comparisons between Pennsylvania’s provision and the federal laws, however, are inexact, experts said. According to a statement from OSHA, what doctors can disclose and to whom would come down to “the terms of the agreement between the employer and the health care provider.”
In any case, there is little precedent for how nondisclosure agreements between doctors and companies would work when the patients are residents near a fracking site, not company employees, experts said.
If the state guidelines are stringent, doctors probably will forgo the agreement _ and the information they are seeking from a company, Goldstein and other physicians said. That, too, could imperil doctors.
“It exposes us to lawsuits from our own patients, who might say, ‘Why didn’t you sign the confidentiality agreement?’ or if you did, ‘Why didn’t you share the information with so-and-so?’ ” said Dr. Mehernosh Khan, who has filed suit against the state over the provision. “The law sets up a precedent for doctors not being able to practice medicine properly.”
Geologist to speak in JT on natural gas development
www.tnonline.com/2012/apr/23/geologist-speak-jt-natural-gas-development
Monday, April 23, 2012
Brian Oram, a professional geologist and soil scientist and founder of B.F. Environmental Consultants Inc., will be conducting a community informational session “Marcellus Shale 101” at the Mauch Chunk Museum on Broadway in Jim Thorpe, on Wednesday, April 25, at 7 p.m.
“The work going on today in the area defined by the Marcellus Shale has proven to be a divisive and polarizing topic,” said Oram. “Understanding the risks and benefits these operations pose for residents of the area and the country as a whole requires us to take a much closer look and separate what we know as fact from what we’ve simply been told.
“We need to work as a community and I am honored to help support the education outreach efforts of the Carbon County Groundwater Guardians and the Girl Scouts.”
Oram is a former professor of geology for Wilkes University. In addition to the Marcellus Shale, he will discuss water, wells and the need for baseline water testing for homeowners.
There is no cost to attend the session, which is being hosted by three Ambassador Girl Scouts working toward the Gold Award, the highest award in Girl Scouts. Part of the requirement for the award is to choose a topic and advocate or educate the community about it.
About Carbon County Groundwater Guardians
The Carbon County Groundwater Guardians (CCGG) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, volunteer, environmental education organization which provides homeowners with information on private wells, water quality and quantity, and septic systems. We are dedicated to protecting private well owners from illnesses caused by our drinking water. For more information visit carbonwaters.org.
About B.F. Environmental Consultants, Inc.
B.F. Environmental Consultants, based in Northeastern Pennsylvania and the Poconos, has been providing professional geological, soils, hydrogeological, and environmental consulting services since 1985. The company specializes in the following areas: hydrogeological and wastewater evaluations for siting land-based wastewater disposal systems; soils consulting (soil scientists); environmental monitoring; and overseeing the siting, exploration, and development of community/commercial water supply sources.
Study suggests shale-gas development causing rapid landscape change
live.psu.edu/story/59331#nw69
Friday, April 20, 2012
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — As the Marcellus natural-gas play unfolds in Pennsylvania, several trends are
The greatest amount of Marcellus Shale natural gas development falls within the Susquehanna River basin.becoming increasingly clear, according to researchers at Penn State.
First, most of the development is occurring on private land, and the greatest amount of development falls within the Susquehanna River basin. Second, a regional approach to siting drilling infrastructure is needed to help minimize development in core forest and productive agricultural lands and to decrease the potential risk to waterways.
Patrick Drohan, assistant professor of pedology in the College of Agricultural Sciences, was lead investigator on a study that examined the early effects of Marcellus gas development on landcover change and forest fragmentation in the Keystone State.
Drohan estimates that slightly more than half of the well pads in Pennsylvania occur on agricultural land; most of the rest are on forestland, but many of those are on core forest that is privately owned.
The loss of agricultural land to shale-gas development presents some concern because, in some areas, drilling is now competing with food production for space on the landscape, the study states.
“Our results suggest,” said Drohan, “that shale-gas development could substantially alter Pennsylvania’s landscape. The development of new roads to support drilling could affect forest ecosystem integrity via increased fragmentation.”
The fragmentation of forestland, especially northern core forest, places headwater streams and larger downstream waterways at risk of pollution, the study suggests. Based on the intensity of development in the Susquehanna River basin, future expansion of shale-gas production in this basin could become a significant land- and water-management challenge for Chesapeake Bay water quality and ecosystem services.
The concentration of existing core forest in the northern part of the state — and the focus of drilling in this area, largely on private land — led the researchers to conclude that remaining areas of public land are key refuges for the protection of wildlife, ecosystems and associated ecosystem services.
“These areas should receive further protection,” Drohan said. “An organized effort across government and private entities may be a way to manage development.”
Coauthors of the study, which was published in the March 25 issue of the journal Environmental Management, were Margaret Brittingham, professor of wildlife resources; Joseph Bishop, research associate in geography; and Kevin Yoder, former field assistant in the School of Forest Resources.
The research was sponsored by the Heinz Endowments, Marcellus Center for Outreach and Research and the USDA-NRCS Soil Survey program
Environmental, legal expert speaks about recent ‘fracking’ legislation
www.lehighvalleylive.com/thebrownandwhiteblog/index.ssf/2012/04/environmental_legal_expert_spe_1.html
Published: Monday, April 23, 2012
Michael Krancer, secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), spoke and answered questions about Act 13 —a new state law establishing regulations over the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, process being used to drill natural gas out of the Marcellus Shale deposit in many northern and western Pennsylvania counties— at a town hall meeting in Packard 101 Friday.
Act 13 requires drilling companies to report to the DEP the chemicals they use in the fracking process, including concentrations on a well-by-well basis, as well as publically disclose chemicals on FracFocus.org, according to the website of the Pennsylvania Environmental Council, a watchdog group Krancer referenced in his talk.
Questions have been raised about difficulties medical professionals are having under the new law. According to the PEC website, doctors are having trouble getting access to chemical information needed in the diagnosis or treatment of patients. Fracking involves boring a high-pressure mix of water and toxic chemicals into fissures in the ground to force natural gas to the surface.
Evidence that chemicals are leaking from natural gas drilling sites and contaminating private wells and public waterways has turned fracking into a serious environmental and public health concern in Pennsylvania.
The Marcellus shale deposit extends throughout much of northern and western Pennsylvania, and into New York, where a moratorium was placed on drilling in December 2010.
Krancer said that 3 million Pennsylvania residents get their water from private wells — one of the highest proportions of any state in the country. He said 40 percent of the state’s wells have exceeded maximum contaminant levels at some point, regardless of fracking.
Act 13 is the state government’s first attempt to regulate fracking, and Krancer’s talk was intended to reassure residents that the DEP is robustly monitoring the actions of drilling companies.
“We do need to pay attention to what happens at the front end,” he said. “We can’t get the promise of cleaner air through the use of natural gas in transportation without paying attention to what’s happening during the exploration and drilling phase.”
Krancer promised “additional boots on the ground, paid for by permit not taxpayer money” in Bradford county in northeastern Pennsylvania, which has been at the center of the fracking controversy.
“I frankly think we’re getting it right,” Krancer said. “Any form of energy production has aspects that need to be managed. That’s true of coal and oil; it’s true of nuclear power, and it’s true of wind and solar.”
When asked by one audience member how the state can allow fracking to occur in an aquifer, Krancer explained that groundwater supplies usually occur at depths of several hundred feet below the earth’s surface and that natural gas drilling occurs far below those depths —at depths of around 8,000 feet.
Krancer called Act 13 one of the most progressive and environmentally forward-thinking regulations in the country; he said it is modeled on a Colorado law that was hailed by environmental groups nationwide when it was passed.
“We’re going to have increased monitoring during the earthmoving process,” Krancer said. “We have more inspectors than Oklahoma; and if we need more, we’re going to get more.”
Krancer said that the state will take cases of non-compliance seriously, prosecuting where necessary.
“I happen to believe in enforcement and so does the governor,” Krancer said.
He also reminding the audience that Pennsylvania’s Republican Governor, Tom Corbett, served eight years as state attorney general, and as chief U.S. attorney in Pittsburgh before that, where he prosecuted environmental violators.
Krancer called himself a believer in free-market economics. He said drilling companies that don’t comply with the new environmental regulations are trying to “steal a competitive advantage from those that are complying.”
“I have a fundamental idea that cheaters should be called out,” he said.
Regulation and monitoring makes sense from both environmental and economic standpoints, he said.
“The free marketplace is the engine for a lot of research and development, opportunities that don’t exist in other parts of the world,” Krancer said.
Krancer also said “the ethos of compliance has to be in the company.”
He cited his experience as general council for Excelon Corporation, an energy company where, Krancer said, the CEO enforced compliance with a top-down mentality. Ten members of Lehigh’s environmental student group Green Action attended Krancer’s talk.
“We wanted to mobilize for this event because Secretary Krancer takes a strong stance in favor of drilling the Marcellus Shale, and we hoped showing him that well-educated students think he is making a big mistake,” said Green Action president Tyler Tobin, ’12, in an email.
“Natural gas wells emit plumes of methane into the atmosphere contributing to climate change; the well casings are not 100 percent perfect, allowing frack fluids and gases to escape the well shaft and enter ground water,” Tobin said, detailing some of the environmental concerns associated with fracking.
“The lagoons where spent frack fluid are held infiltrate into ground water and run off into surface water; on top of it all there seems to be a huge environmental justice issue where companies pay off poor families for their mineral rights then completely de-value their land and livelihood,” Tobin said.
The meeting was co-sponsored by Lehigh’s Environmental Initiative, the Office of the Vice President and Associate Provost for Research and Graduate Studies and the engineering school.
Story by Brown and White news writer Kirk Greenwood, ’12.
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Lack of snow and rain prompt Pa. officials to discuss drought potential
www.therepublic.com/view/story/33c64dbf097042838eb0ad5d3aa8f9a5/PA–Drought-Fears/
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Just after Pennsylvanians dried off from one of the wettest years on record, professional weather-watchers are becoming concerned about a potential drought in the central and eastern parts of the state.
The state’s Drought Task Force, which includes representatives of the Department of Environmental Protection, the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, the National Weather Service and other government agencies, will meet April 25 to discuss the effects of a winter with little snowfall and a drier-than-usual spring, officials said Tuesday.
It remains to be seen whether that leads to the DEP declaring a drought watch encouraging residents in certain areas to conserve water, as Maryland officials did last week for most of the Eastern Shore.
“At this point we’re not taking any action,” said Ruth Miller of PEMA, which helped direct relief efforts during last year’s historic flooding from Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee, which killed 18 people and damaged or destroyed tens of thousands of homes and businesses.
Now, in contrast to those back-to-back disasters in August and September, the Susquehanna and Delaware rivers are flowing at record low rates for this time of year.
Susan Weaver, a DEP official who serves as the state drought coordinator, said officials assess data on precipitation, surface water, ground water and soil moisture in 90-day increments before deciding whether to issue a drought watch or a more emphatic drought warning.
“The tough part is what’s going to happen tomorrow,” Weaver said.
In August, “we issued a drought watch and I swear to God the next day it started to rain and it didn’t stop,” she said.
On Tuesday, the Susquehanna was flowing at around 14,000 cubic feet per second — less than 20 percent of its normal rate and the slowest flow since 1910, said hydrologist Charles Ross at the weather service office in State College. The average depth was barely half the normal seven feet, he said.
Still, “all it’s going to take is some average rain and we’ll probably be in pretty good shape,” Ross said.
The situation was similar on the Delaware, where the flow in Trenton, N.J., was measured at less than 4,000 cubic feet per second — the lowest for that date in the 98 years it has been measured.
“We’ve actually been setting records for a week or so,” said Clarke Rupert, spokesman for the Delaware River Basin Commission.
Susan Obleski, spokeswoman for the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, said dry conditions along streams that feed the river have led the commission to temporarily suspend permits that allow some natural gas drilling companies to use that water. So far, 14 permits held by eight companies have been suspended.
“They have multiple sources (of water), so it doesn’t mean that (a) particular company would shut down,” she said.
Ex-DEP Official Says All Pa. Oil, Gas Waste Needs Treatment
www.manufacturing.net/news/2012/04/ex-dep-official-says-all-pa-oil-gas-waste-needs-treatment
Mon, 04/16/2012
PITTSBURGH (AP) — A former top environmental official says Pennsylvania’s successful efforts to keep Marcellus Shale wastewater away from drinking water supplies should be extended to all other oil and gas drillers.
“It’s the same industry. It is the same contaminants. And the goal should be the same,” said George Jugovic Jr., who was formerly the Department of Environmental Protection’s southwest regional director. He’s now president of PennFuture, an environmental group.
An AP analysis of state data found that in the second half of 2011 about 1.86 million barrels — or about 78 million gallons — of drilling wastewater from conventional oil and gas wells were still being sent to treatmentplants that discharge into rivers.
The core issue is whether a problem in waterways has been solved, or if more needs to be done.
In 2010 health experts raised alarms when they found soaring levels of ultra-salty bromides in rivers and streams that are major sources of drinking water. The general view was that wastewater from Marcellus Shalegas drilling — polluted with heavy bromides from deep underground — was contributing to the problem.
High levels of bromides can contaminate drinking water with levels that exceed national safety standards and are potentially harmful. Though not considered a pollutant by themselves, the bromides combine with the chlorine used in water treatment to produce trihalomethanes, which may cause cancer if ingested over a long period of time.
Bromide levels were so high in rivers during 2010 that they caused corrosion at some plants that were using the water.
But since the spring of 2011 most Marcellus drillers have been recycling the fluids, or sending then to deep underground wells mostly in Ohio.
The gas-rich Marcellus, which lies thousands of feet underground, has attracted a gold rush of drillers who have drilled almost 5,000 new wells in the last five years. But the state also has about 70,000 older oil and gaswells, according to DEP statistics, that target different, shallower reserves.
Researchers say the bromide levels did drop last summer, but they had also expected even more of a decline after virtually all of the Marcellus Shale drillers stopped disposing wastewater into plants that discharge into rivers.
But conventional oil and gas wells weren’t included in last year’s recycling push — a loophole that state environmental officials downplayed at the time.
Jugovic said DEP secretary Mike Krancer should now take “the next step” and get voluntary compliance from the rest of the gas industry.
“It’s hard scientifically to justify a distinction between treating conventional wastewater differently. The wastewater is being disposed in plants that are not capable of treating those contaminants,” he said.
Dave Mashek, a spokesman for the Pa. Independent Oil & Gas Association, declined to comment.
Kevin Sunday, a DEP spokesman, claimed that the volume of conventional oil and gas waste is “substantially smaller” than the Marcellus amounts.
But the AP found that 78 million gallons of oil and gas wastewater were still being taken to treatment plants in the last half of 2011 — about 33 percent less than the Marcellus quantity that was raising concerns in 2010, but still a substantial amount. If that rate continues, the conventional wells will send about 150 million gallons of the wastewater to treatment plants that discharge into rivers this year.
Sunday said the agency encourages wastewater recycling, “regardless of the industry involved,” and added that the conventional oil and gas drillers don’t produce as much wastewater as the Marcellus drillers.
Sunday also said that the agency has created a new, revised permit to encourage recycling of waste. Ten facilities have applied for the new permit, and if all are approved, that would double the number of such facilities in the state.
David Sternberg, a spokesman for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, didn’t directly answer a question about whether there was any scientific justification for treating the non-Marcellus waste differently. Sternberg said EPA, which urged Pennsylvania regulators last year to halt the dumping, is working closely with state regulators “to ensure that, where wastewater treatment facilities are accepting oil and gas wastewaters, discharges from these treatment facilities are in compliance with the Clean Water Act.”
Jugovic said that some previous assumptions about the non-Marcellus waste turned out to be false. For example, there were suggestions that it generally contained much lower levels of bromides and other contaminants.
He said some of the shallow wells had very high levels of total dissolved solids and other contaminants that can be a problem for drinking water supplies.
Jugovic also said that the fact that 97 percent of Marcellus drillers appear to be complying with the wastewater restrictions raises a fairness issue. Why, he asked, should the conventional oil and gas drillers and the remaining 3 percent of drillers get a pass?
Now, researchers are waiting for expected lower river levels in the summer, to see if the bromide problem has really gone away. The higher flows in early spring dilute any contaminants and make it harder to draw conclusions about the bromides.
New website provides guidance on Marcellus Shale development
live.psu.edu/story/59159#nw69
Friday, April 13, 2012
The 'Marcellus Shale Electronic Field Guide' provides information about mitigating landscape changes as a result of natural-gas development, such as the well-pad construction pictured here.
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A new website developed by Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences and Penn State Extension offers assistance in land management at all stages of shale-gas infrastructure development.
The “Marcellus Shale Electronic Field Guide” is an unbiased manual aimed at presenting the best possible options in Marcellus Shale development for Pennsylvania’s future.
“The guide provides a comprehensive overview of how landscapes change during shale-gas development and offers ways throughout the process to minimize adverse effects while maximizing long-term site restoration success,” said Patrick Drohan, assistant professor of pedology and one of the website’s lead authors.
The guide’s sections reflect the questions asked most frequently by landowners and managers and by gas-industry employees.
The field guide introduces ecological concepts relevant to shale-gas development, including habitat fragmentation and restoration and basic wildlife science. It includes sections on predevelopment issues, such as effects of shale-gas development on agriculture and forestland, control of site activity, soil erosion and compaction, and planning for spills, accidents and invasive species control.
Restoration of shale-gas development sites is explored through pages on setting goals for restoration, landscape reconstruction, revegetation options, and restoring or creating wildlife habitat. The site includes detailed analyses of important wildlife species in Pennsylvania: wild turkey, ruffed grouse and white-tailed deer, with more featured species to come.
Landowners looking for general guidance on leasing provisions may benefit from sample leases and a section on best management practices.
The field guide also includes an image gallery and a public forum in which registered users can ask questions and receive feedback from those with on-the-ground experience.
“Exploration and development of natural gas within the Marcellus Shale formation is occurring at an accelerating rate across much of Pennsylvania and may produce large-scale ecological change,” said Margaret Brittingham, professor of wildlife resources and website co-author.
“There is a critical need among public and private landowners for information on how to develop drilling sites and their associated infrastructure so as to minimize ecological damage and allow restoration of sites to predrilling conditions,” she said. “We hope this website helps to fill that need.”
The website is based on work supported by the Heinz Endowments and was designed by Penn State’s Center for Environmental Informatics. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in the field guide are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the view of the sponsor.
The website, which is also accessible from smart phones and similar devices, can be viewed at http://marcellusfieldguide.org/index.php
Drilling law hurts health, docs say
thetimes-tribune.com/news/gas-drilling/drilling-law-hurts-health-docs-say-1.1298897#axzz1rpg4bvIU
Published: April 12, 2012
PITTSBURGH – Public health advocates and doctors on the front lines of Pennsylvania’s natural-gas-drilling boom are attacking the state’s new Marcellus Shale law, likening one of its provisions to a gag order and complaining that vital research money into health effects was stripped at the last minute.
Doctors say they don’t know what to tell patients who suspect their ailments are related to nearby gas industry activity because of a lack of research on whether the drilling of thousands of new wells – many near houses and drinking-water supplies – has made some people sick.
Yet when legislative leaders and the governor’s office negotiated the most sweeping update of the state’s oil and gas law in a quarter century, they stripped $2 million annually that included a statewide health registry to track respiratory problems, skin conditions, stomach ailments and other illnesses potentially related to gas drilling.
Just last week, the Department of Health refused to give The Associated Press copies of its responses to people who complain that drilling had affected their health. That lack of transparency – justified in the name of protecting private medical information – means the public has no way of knowing even how many complaints there are or how many are valid.
Studies are urgently needed to determine if any of the drilling has affected human health, said Dr. Poune Saberi, a University of Pennsylvania physician and public health expert.
“We don’t really have a lot of time,” said Saberi, who said she’s talked to about 30 people around Pennsylvania over the past 18 months who blame their ailments on gas drilling.
Working out of public view, legislative negotiators also inserted a requirement that doctors sign a confidentiality agreement in return for access to proprietary information on chemicals used in the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, process.
Read more
EPA: Water quality OK at 20 wells in Pa. gas town
www.businessweek.com/ap/2012-04/D9TVLHPG0.htm
DIMOCK, Pa.
Testing at 20 more water wells in a northeastern Pennsylvania community at the center of a debate over the safety of natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale shows no dangerous levels of contamination, according to a report issued Friday by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The EPA had already tested 11 wells in Dimock, showing the presence of sodium, methane, chromium or bacteria in six of the wells before the results of the latest round of testing.
Three of the newly-tested wells showed methane while one showed barium well above the EPA’s maximum level, but a treatment system installed in the well is removing the substance, an EPA spokesman said.
Featured in the documentary “Gasland,” the Susquehanna County village of Dimock has been at the center of a fierce debate over drilling, in particular the process of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The process involves injecting a mixture of water and chemicals deep underground to free trapped natural gas so it can be brought to the surface.
State environmental regulators previously determined that Houston-based Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. contaminated the aquifer underneath homes along Carter Road in Dimock with explosive levels of methane gas, although they later determined the company had met its obligation to provide safe drinking water to residents.
The EPA is still providing drinking water to three homes where prior tests showed contamination. A second round of tests is under way, regulators said.
A group of Dimock residents suing Cabot assert their water is also polluted with drilling chemicals, while others say that the water is clean and the plaintiffs are exaggerating problems with their wells to help their lawsuit.
A Cabot spokesman said in a statement Friday that the “data confirms the earlier EPA finding that levels of contaminants found do not possess a threat to human health and the environment.”
“Importantly, the EPA again did not indicate that those contaminants that were detected bore any relationship to oil and gas development in the Dimock area, particularly given the fact that any contaminants are more likely indicative of naturally-occurring background levels or other unrelated activities,” the statement said.
EPA faces suit from 11 groups over coal ash
www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/health/epa-faces-suit-from-11-groups-over-coal-ash-630121/
April 6, 2012 12:00 am
By Don Hopey / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Eleven environmental organizations are suing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to force it to better regulate toxic coal ash and citing recent groundwater contamination at 29 coal ash dump sites in 16 states, including two in Western Pennsylvania.
According to the EPA’s own data, coal ash has caused contamination of groundwater at coal-fired power plants in Homer City, Indiana County, and near New Castle, Lawrence County.
Earthjustice, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the other groups Thursday in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., said in a release that the EPA hasn’t updated coal ash disposal and control regulations in more than 30 years and that it continues to delay new rules despite recent evidence of “leaking waste ponds, poisoned groundwater supplies and threats to public health.”
Coal ash is produced mainly by coal-fired power plants and contains a mixture of toxic chemicals and compounds, Earthjustice said, including arsenic, lead, hexavalent chromium, manganese, mercury, selenium and cadmium.
The EPA data, based on a 2010 questionnaire sent to 700 fossil- and nuclear-fueled power plants to asses water discharges, show ash from GenOn’s 60-year-old, 330-megawatt New Castle power plant in West Pittsburg, Lawrence County, has contaminated groundwater with arsenic.
The 1,884-megawatt Homer City power plant operated by Midwest Generation EME LLC and owned by General Electric, uses 19 ponds or landfills to dispose of its ash and, according to the EPA, has contaminated groundwater with iron, lead, manganese and sulfate.
GenOn, which announced in March it will close the New Castle power plant in April 2015, did not return calls requesting comment. Midwest Generation EME, operator of the 43-year-old power plant 50 miles east of Pittsburgh, also did not return calls.
The environmental groups’ lawsuit seeks an order to force the EPA to set deadlines for review and revision of coal ash regulations, as well as changes to tests done to determine if the waste is hazardous under federal law.
“The numbers of coal ash ponds and landfills that are contaminating water supplies continues to grow, yet nearby communities still do not have effective federal protection,” said Lisa Evans, an Earthjustice attorney.
Eric Schaeffer, executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project and a former EPA regulator, said the dumping of toxic coal ash is on the rise. In 2010, he said, toxic heavy metals in power plant ash disposal topped 113 million pounds, a nearly 10 percent increase from 2009.
In September 2010, the EPA held public hearings in Pittsburgh and six other cities across the nation on a proposal to federally regulate coal ash for the first time, a proposal that the coal and power industries opposed. Industry leaders at the hearing said federal regulation would be costly, hurt the industry, cost jobs and increase electric rates.
Mr. Schaeffer said EPA’s proposed standards for safe disposal, including a plan to close unsafe ash ponds within five years, “have gone nowhere.”
The nation’s power plants produce approximately 150 million tons of ash a year, about 20 tons of that in Pennsylvania.
Don Hopey: dhopey@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1983.
First Published 2012-04-06