Clarks Summit business conducts independent testing

http://citizensvoice.com/news/clarks-summit-business-conducts-independent-testing-1.915898

Clarks Summit business conducts independent testing

BY ELIZABETH SKRAPITS (STAFF WRITER)
Published: August 2, 2010

Concern about the potential for drinking water contamination by natural gas drilling is keeping Andy Goldberg busy.

Goldberg, owner of Independent Water Testing in Clarks Summit, travels throughout Lackawanna, Luzerne, Susquehanna, Bradford and Wayne counties to do baseline testing on drinking water wells, and has had inquiries about his service from as far away as West Virginia and Michigan.

“My office is my car. I do between (600 to 800) miles a week,” he said.

Goldberg said he graduated from Harvard and worked in health care in New York for 16 years. Independent Water Testing is a new business and he’s the sole employee – so far.

“There is a huge need for the service,” he explained. “People have a lot of questions about what’s going on, what do they need to be concerned about, how to protect themselves and from what.”

Natural gas companies have been leasing land throughout Northeastern Pennsylvania, and exploratory wells are being drilled in southern Wyoming and northern Luzerne counties.

“It’s happening very fast. People have lots of questions,” Goldberg said. “I try to, in addition to providing this service, be a source of information and to help people as they educate themselves on this issue.”

Goldberg said he tests water with the three-tiered system developed by Penn State Cooperative Extension to find contaminants most likely to be caused through natural gas drilling. He uses a state-accredited laboratory.

“The business first and last revolves around making sure you can stand up in court and support the work you did .… to provide that backing for your homeowner against, potentially, a large gas company,” he said.

He advises homeowners to get their wells tested before any earth disturbance, and retested on an annual basis to check for problems such as bacterial contamination, which is a fairly easy fix.

Goldberg’s Web site, IndependentWaterTesting.com, has educational resources including a map showing where gas well permits were issued so people can judge how close they are and whether their homes are above or below the well site.

“Proximity is hard to address, because you might be very near a well and still not drawing water from a source affected by drilling; you might be very far away and are affected,” he said. “It’s one of those unknowns, or something you can’t be sure of. That’s why there’s a benefit a comfort baseline water testing can provide.”

Hydraulic fracturing, also called fracking, involves shooting millions of gallons of chemical-treated water thousands of feet underground to crack the shale and release the natural gas. Not only is there concern about the chemicals used in the process, but also about the deeply buried substances that surface with the drilling wastewater.

“I liken it to releasing a cork. You’re puncturing the earth, and there’s stuff that’s been down there for millions of years. There are ancient seawater deposits which are very salty and very contaminated, salty to the point of eight to 10 times saltier than typical seawater. And that comes back up in the flowback water, which is all of those brines, plus the compounds and the water and the sand that’s used in the fracking process,” Goldberg said.

“The challenge is you also don’t know how far your well is drawing water from. And depending on the contaminant, there’s the element of solubility. Some contaminants can travel with the water, others travel slower, and you just don’t know.”

Goldberg said he tests for a “comprehensive list” of things likely to identify contamination from gas drilling, including heavy metals and volatile organic compounds. Petroleum distillates are commonly used in fracking, and an elevated level of them in a water well is a “flashing red light” that indicates the need for further, more specific testing, he said.

The state Department of Environmental Protection has released a list of chemicals most commonly found in fracking solutions used in Pennsylvania, and the Penn State tiered tests can help identify contaminants from gas drilling, Goldberg said.

However, “There are only so many things you can practically test for, and economically test for,” he said.

Goldberg says he gets all kinds of customers and inquiries, from the person who has just leased mineral rights to the person who is never going to lease.

“This is a broad-based concern. I have people who call me when they’re on community water or city water or municipal water,” he said.

“They ask if they should have a baseline test. It’s hard to say because there are so many steps between the potential gas well contamination and their faucet. I don’t think it’s going to have much weight in a legal setting.  My hope is that the water utilities are doing similar work to protect their water supplies.”

eskrapits@citizensvoice.com, 570-821-2072

Maintaining quality before drilling begins

http://citizensvoice.com/news/maintaining-quality-before-drilling-begins-1.915857

Maintaining quality before drilling begins

BY ELIZABETH SKRAPITS (STAFF WRITER)
Published: August 2, 2010

JACKSON TWP. – Just as individual property owners are testing their drinking water wells before natural gas drilling starts, Pennsylvania American Water Co. has established a baseline to ensure nothing affects the quality of water the company provides to its thousands of customers.

After giving The Citizens’ Voice a tour of the Ceasetown Reservoir’s filtration plant last week, Pennsylvania American Water representatives explained what the company is doing to augment its water quality monitoring to prevent contamination from natural gas drilling.

Although no gas wells are planned near the Huntsville or Ceasetown reservoirs in Jackson and Lehman townships, Encana Oil & Gas USA Inc. has leased mineral rights to land close to both reservoirs and is preparing to drill an exploratory well in Lake Township, not far from the Lehman Township border.

Pennsylvania American Water Production Manager Mark Cross said the company has met with Encana and showed the gas company maps to indicate where the reservoirs’ watershed is and where future drilling activity could affect them.

“We had a lot of conversations with them to say this is a concern to us, and we need ongoing communication, and we need to know what your plans are,” he said.

Pennsylvania American Water also shared its watershed maps with the state Department of Environmental Protection, Cross said. Although there is no legal requirement to notify water companies when drilling permits are issued, DEP will take the watershed maps into consideration, and Pennsylvania American Water is also keeping up “ongoing dialogue” with the state agency, he said.

“Our focus is we want to know what’s going on out there, we want constant communication, we want to know what is in place out there, what their mitigation measures are, what spill control and response plans they have,” Cross said. “And it’s worked very well. They’ve been very cooperative, both DEP and Encana.”

‘Constantly monitored’

When people in Ashley, Conyngham Township, Courtdale, Edwardsville, Hanover Township, Hunlock Township, Larksville, Nanticoke, Plymouth, Plymouth Township, Pringle, Salem Township, Shickshinny and Wilkes-Barre City turn on their taps, the water probably comes from the Ceasetown  Reservoir, which is fed by Pikes Creek.

Pennsylvania American Water’s 70,000 customers served by the Ceasetown Reservoir have their water treated at a facility in Jackson Township. A similar facility treats the water from the nearby Huntsville  Reservoir, which serves about 29,000 customers. Huntsville serves Dallas, Kingston Township, Swoyersville, West Wyoming and Wyoming.

The “raw water” from the reservoir is piped into the facility in a 42-inch main, where chemicals are added to coagulate the small particles and make them easier to remove, Cross said.

The water then goes through a series of filters, which include irregularly shaped plastic beads that gather impurities, and layers of sand and gravel. The water is treated with chlorine to disinfect it and  lime to adjust the pH level, then it is sent to a series of storage tanks and pump stations for distribution to customers.

Ceasetown’s facility handles a normal flow of 9 million gallons a day, Plant Supervisor Sean Sorber said. During droughts, Harveys Creek is used as an emergency source, but that hasn’t been necessary for about 10 years, Cross said.

“Ceasetown Reservoir is a very good source, very good quality,” he said.

Cross said the water is “constantly monitored” at the plant, and physical tests are done in its lab. A sink in the lab has a series of specialized faucets, each pouring water in a different stage of treatment. Every shift at the plant runs a minimum of two series of 15 tests – about 100 a day – Sorber said.

Because of impending natural gas drilling, Pennsylvania American Water instituted an additional set of parameters, Cross said.

Several months ago full baseline testing started at Pikes Creek, Harveys Creek, the Huntsville Reservoir in several locations, and the raw and treated water at the Huntsville and Ceasetown plants, he said. The water is tested at the plant and in the watershed for substances including volatile organic compounds, methane and total dissolved solids – extremely tiny particles of minerals or organic matter.

“We ran a full series of baseline tests – VOCs, metals, methane – on all of the sources in this Luzerne, Lackawanna and Susquehanna county area that are subject to any possible drilling,” Sorber said. “So we have a good baseline of what we currently have, and those tests will be run periodically also, as activity increases.”

Conductivity tests are one way to measure the amount of total dissolved solids, or TDSs. Changing levels of TDSs could signify a lot of things, including the water is being affected by natural gas drilling. Sorber took a sample of untreated water from one of the faucets and placed a probe in the plastic cup, then checked the meter. It was normal.

“If we see something jumping up, that will be an indication for us there’s something going on. It’s a very straightforward test,” he said.

Besides monitoring and testing, Pennsylvania American Water is active in trying to get Pennsylvania legislation changed, according to PAWC Communications Director Terry Maenza.

Two things the company would like to see changed are adding a requirement for drinking water utilities to be notified of any nearby natural gas drilling permit applications, and to have the buffer zone outside which drilling is allowed increased from 100 feet to 2,500 feet.

“We’re being as vigilant as we possibly can be, just to keep an eye on what’s proposed and before activity takes place, what safeguards are going to be in place,” Maenza said.

eskrapits@citizensvoice.com, 570-821-2072