Fracking Waste Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

EPA Declines to Regulate Waste as Ohio Valley Fracking Booms

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last week said it will not strengthen regulations on waste created by oil and gas production, a move that could affect communities across the Ohio Valley where the oil and gas industry is booming in the Appalachian Basin.

No federal agency fully regulates oil and gas drilling byproducts — which include brine, or salty water laced with chemicals and metals, as well as similarly-contaminated sludge, rock and mud — leaving tracking and handling to states.

EPA’s decision released last week stems from a 2016 lawsuit filed by environmental groups, who had petitioned the agency to make new rules for how it regulates oil and gas waste. When the agency failed to respond, a federal judge required EPA to formally respond by this spring.

The decision reaffirms that states are in charge of regulating the disposal of chemical-laced and often radioactive liquids and solids created by the oil and gas industry.

Environmental advocates decried the move. They argue regulations for both onsite storage of waste and offsite disposal vary widely from state to state.

A 2016 report from the Center for Public Integrity calls the radioactive waste stream from horizontal oil and gas operations “orphan waste” because no single government agency is fully managing it. Each state is left to figure out its own plan. Advocates say EPA rules would create a baseline for how millions of tons of liquid and solid waste should be disposed.

“In a word or a sentence, the Trump administration hung out to dry communities that host oil and gas development,” said Aaron Mintzes with Earthworks, one of the group’s that pursued this issue in court.

Mintzes said a loophole in the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, a federal law that governs how solid waste should be disposed, allowed EPA in 1988 to classify waste from oil and gas operations as “non-hazardous.” This gives operators wide latitude in how to dispose of it.

For example, some states allow drillers to dispose of wastewater by injecting it back into the ground, but that can lead to pollution and even earthquakes.

In its decision document, EPA acknowledged that the rise of hydraulic fracturing, in which drillers go much deeper and are more likely to bring up waste products with naturally-occurring radioactivity, has changed the composition of waste. Ultimately, however the agency said state programs appear to sufficient.

In its review, the agency looked at state regulations for 28 of the 34 states with oil and gas production and concluded while the scope and specificity of the regulatory programs varied, “the existing state programs incorporate a majority of elements found in federal waste management program programs, which indicates that the scope of the written state regulation is robust.”

However, activists and some regulators worry that inconsistencies in state regulations could mean that waste is being “shopped around” by companies seeking or unsafely reused.

That is what happened in Estill County, Kentucky.

Estill Landfill

In 2016, the Ohio Valley ReSource reported tons of radioactive frack waste was hauled from state to state before being improperly disposed of in a county landfill not designed to hold radioactive material.

The waste was deposited in the Blue Ridge Landfill, which is across the street from the Estill County High School and Estill County Middle School.

In the years since the waste was discovered, the landfill owners have been fined and are required to create a corrective action plan. Officials with the Kentucky Energy and Environmental Cabinet want to keep the waste in place.

The waste contains an unknown amount of radium 226, which has a half life of 1,600 years, but the liner below the landfill where it was dumped is only slated to last 450 years.

Local residents with the group Concerned Citizens of Estill County disagree with the state’s plan and say officials have not been transparent in the process. They have filed a petition with the EEC’s Office of Administrative Hearings seeking a review of the state’s decision.

Mary Cromer is a lawyer with the Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center that is representing the group.

“The uncertainty about the health impacts and how much was really brought in and how hot it is, makes those health concerns even more prevalent and concerning,” Cromer said.

She said the group expects a hearing this summer.

Ky. Finalizes $95K Fine for Radioactive Dump at Landfill

State officials have finalized an agreement with an eastern Kentucky disposal company that illegally dumped low-level radioactive fracking waste from West Virginia.

The state Energy and Environment Cabinet says it has signed an agreed order that proposed a $95,000 civil penalty for Advance Disposal Services Blue Ridge Landfill in Estill County. The agreement was proposed in October.

The state cabinet’s investigation revealed that 92 loads of waste were illegally brought from West Virginia to the Blue Ridge site in violation of state law. The waste is classified as “technologically enhanced naturally occurring radioactive materials.”

The agreement requires Blue Ridge to deposit $60,000 of the fine into an escrow account for the Estill County School District to pay toward the detection and mitigation of naturally occurring radon or establishing educational programs related to environmental sciences.

Federal Court Strikes Down Fayette Frack Waste Ban

A federal judge has ruled that the Fayette County Commission does not have the right to ban frack waste. Last Friday, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia ruled in favor of EQT, a petroleum and gas corporation.

After years of public concern and protests of an underground injection well in Fayette County, the County Commission unanimously voted to ban frack waste in January of this year. This ordinance is based on state code WV §7-1-3kk, which gives authority to commissions to develop regulations to protect public health. Pittsburgh-based EQT protested the ban in court.

The company operates about 200 oil and gas wells in Fayette County, along with one underground injection control well.

Judge John Copenhaver ruled in favor of the company stating that state and federal law trump county ordinances. In his ruling, Copenhaver cited a 1999 decision in City of Huntington v. the State Water Commission, stating that “Public health is a matter of statewide rather than local or municipal interest or concern and in the regulation of public health the power of the state is supreme.”

The Fayette County Commission’s Prosecuting Attorney’s Office hasn’t said whether or not the Commission will appeal the decision.

W.Va. Continues to Wrestle with Radioactive Drilling Waste

In the growing wake of the natural gas boom, West Virginia has been trying to figure out what exactly to do with waste generated by the oil and gas industry.

The waste presents unique challenges because there’s so much of it, and because it’s often laced with some pretty toxic stuff. The answer by and large is to bury the solid waste in municipal landfills – the same landfills that accept our household trash. A recent study conducted by the state’s Department of Environmental Protection says the practice is safe, for the most part. But many people are skeptical and worried about what’s going to happen in the long term.

A few weeks ago I drove up along Cider Run road to the entrance of the Wetzel County landfill and pulled over.

You can’t drive in unless you’re just dropping a load off, and the company that operates this facility didn’t respond to my requests to enter and have a look around. Save for the sign and the weigh station, it really just looks like any other back holler in West Virginia. The single lane road to the landfill follows a creek along a valley between forested hills that curve steeply up and away.

Wetzel County Solid Waste Authority member, Bill Hughes, was with me. He also hasn’t been allowed into the facility, but he’s spent time at the entrance monitoring traffic.

Hughes is a grandfather-of-nine who’s lived in the area for over 40 years. He’s been lobbying lawmakers and writing opinion pieces questioning the safety of how natural gas companies go about drilling and what they do with waste.

“The yellow goal posts that you’re seeing,” Hughes said pointing to the weigh station at the entrance of the landfill, “those are referred to as Ludlum detectors and they are looking for radiation.”

Radioactive Waste

Landfills that accept drill cuttings are required to have radioactivity detectors because waste rock and mud pulled from rock formations deep in the ground is often laced with radioactive materials.

But Hughes and other people are worried that radioactive waste is getting into their landfill in spite of the detectors, and possibly leaching out. In response to concerns about the drilling waste, the legislature asked the DEP to commission a study. That study was released earlier this year.

“The research ‘found little concern’” DEP said, “regarding leachate associated with ‘drill cuttings that were placed in approved landfills.”

But it also found that the leachate is toxic, and that it does contain radioactive material.

“It’s clear that the discharge concentrations of several of the parameters are exceeding what the state water quality limits are,” said the director of the West Virginia Water Research Institute, Paul Ziemkievicz, who took a closer look at the DEP study. “But remember these leachates are not going directly into the waters of the United States.”

Dilution Solution

The radioactive material doesn’t go directly into groundwater or rivers, because there are multiple liners around the landfill. The liquid collects in those liners and is pumped out. It’s usually taken to a wastewater treatment facility. But the treatment facilities are not designed to accept industrial wastes. They’re owned by local governments and are the same places that treat sewage and other municipal wastewaters … waters which are then discharged into rivers. The DEP’s study demonstrates that these facilities are currently diluting the leachate to safe drinking water quality standards.

But some people are still worried.

“I want to refrain from being alarmist, but I will say that much of the data are alarming,” said Marc Glass, a remediation specialists who works for the Morgantown-based environmental consulting firm, Downstream Strategies.

“The amount of environmental contaminant that we’re generating,” Glass said, “we’re taking from a place that’s safely sequestered in the earth and mixing them in our environment on a large scale.”

Concentrating NORM

There are several different constituents in the waste that you might not want to tango with, among them is what’s called Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material or NORM.

According to the World Nuclear Association, NORM is basically everywhere at low levels. It’s not like gamma radiation which can penetrate steel walls. NORMs are mostly particles that are unlikely to penetrate most any hard surface – even skin can be an effective barrier. This type of radioactive material is really only a harmful, cancer-causing agent if ingested – as in breathed in or swallowed.

Water experts like Ziemkievicz are not overly concerned about current levels of radioactive waste being discharged into the environment, but they ARE worried about the long-term implications of current practices.

“With radioactivity you’re always concerned about accumulation,” Ziemkievicz said, “not the immediate concentration you might be getting out of an effluent.”

Other experts are also concerned about accumulation, especially given the amount of waste we could conceivably generate over the next 30 years or more. Glass, over at Downstream Strategies, believes the DEP leachate study miscalculated how much waste will be produced in the future. About 16 hundred wells exist today, but about 4000 have been permitted. DEP anticipates another 5,000 to 15,000 wells are yet to be drilled.

“Even if we made conservative assumptions,” Glass said, “my best guess based on the sources [the DEP] cite, we should be looking at maybe even 70,000 or 100,000 Marcellus shale well equivalents of what we will be disposing of in the next 20 to 50 years.”

Conclusions

Glass says the DEP’s study indicates that West Virginia needs to reevaluate how we’re treating the leachate from landfill because it’s not effective, and he says we should expect that problem to get much worse as the scale of drilling increases.

The DEP is recommending improved monitoring of leachate, groundwater and even water wells around landfills, but some groups don’t think the state can be trusted to handle the problem. The National Resources Defense Council and the West Virginia Surface Owners Association, among others, are threatening to sue the federal Environmental Protection Agency to force it to step in.

Fracking Waste Study Says States Aren't Doing Enough to Protect Public

A new report was published this month that looks at how states are dealing with dangerous waste produced during shale gas development. Not well, according to the report.

Defining Hazardous

The Environmental Protection Agency regulates the disposal of toxic or hazardous materials. Such waste includes things that may contain heavy metals, chemicals, dangerous pathogens, radiation, or other toxins. Horizontal drilling produces both liquid and solid waste streams which can contain heavy metals, dangerous chemicals, salts and radiation. But you will never hear it referred to as toxic or hazardous by anyone, officially.

Amy Mall, senior policy analyst with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a Washington-based nonprofit, explains that thirty years ago the EPA exempted oil and gas waste from the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA).

“So right now, oil and gas waste, regardless of how toxic it is, can be treated like normal household waste in many parts of the country,” Mall said.

“Wasting Away”

There’s a new report: (Wasting Away – Four states’ failure to manage oil and gas waste in the Marcellus and Utica Shale) that examines this subject published by Earthworks – a nonprofit concerned with the adverse impacts of mineral and energy development. Lead author Nadia Steinzor explains that the EPA didn’t exempt the industry because the waste wasn’t considered a threat, but because state regulation of this waste was considered adequate. Of course, this was a couple decades before the horizontal gas drilling boom.

Steinzor and her colleagues decided to see what they could learn about waste practices in West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York, where Marcellus and Utica shale gas are being developed.

The report indicates that states are well behind the curve in adapting to the natural gas boom: good characterizations of the waste is incomplete according to a 2014 study that’s cited; and not much information is available about where the waste is coming from, going to, or how it gets there.

West Virginia’s Oil and Gas Waste Management

West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection officials say most information that does exist about oil and gas production and waste disposal procedures is available online. What information isn’t public can be accessed with a fee and a Freedom of Information Act request.

DEP spokesperson Kelley Gillenwater says her agency is going above and beyond what’s required by law to make information more accessible and is currently working on a project to digitize and make public the information they collect. She says, however, that project is in the early stages and a timeframe for completion doesn’t exist yet.

Steinzor’s report argues that states don’t require enough information and often rely on operators to self-report in good faith.

The Earthworks report cites a 2013 study that says nearly half of all liquid oil and gas waste is shipped out of state, the remainder is injected underground. But Amy Mall from NRDC says rules for injection wells everywhere are also in need of attention.

“We think the rules for those disposal wells need to be much stronger than they are now because those disposal wells are not designed to handle toxic waste.”

Steinzor does credit West Virginia for taking some steps to address solid waste problems in the state. The sheer volume of drill cuttings, which at one point was simply being buried onsite, may have helped force the issue. Municipal landfills do accept the waste even though it’s largely uncharacterized. Requirements are now in place for the waste to be held in separate storage cells within landfills and DEP is working with Marshall University to study the leachate from those facilities. Results from that study are scheduled to be presented to state lawmakers this July.

West Virginia University is also teaming with the Department of Energy to better characterize waste streams from two Marcellus wells in Morgantown. Drilling is expected to begin in November.

Environmental Advocates

One other thing West Virginia may have going for it is a small office within the DEP, the Environmental Advocate Office.

“The advocate office really grew out of DEP’s recognizing that there’s a growing environmental awareness in the public and that citizens want to be part of the conversation,” said John King, an Environmental Resource Analyst within the Advocate Office.

“More important than that: DEP recognizes that public participation is essential to environmental protection.”

King fields many calls from citizens concerned about oil and gas waste management as well as other issues related to gas development. While it may not be the responsibility of members of the public to be the boots on the ground for the DEP, King says protecting state resources and public health may nonetheless require participation and investment of communities throughout the state. His office is interested in facilitating better communication between industry and community stakeholders.

Was This Fayette County Waste Pit Leaking?

Danny Webb Construction began shutting down above ground pits last month in Fayette County that held oil and gas waste. The waste likely came from horizontal drilling operations.

In a more recent development, the DEP says a tank that was holding some of that waste, leaked during the process, but was cleaned up.

Concerned citizens have been expressing concerns with this particular operation for years.

Environmental groups ran some tests last year and while results have turned up inconclusive, it still raised red flags.

What was stored in the pits?

Marc Glass with Downstream Strategies is familiar with the site and was even hired to collect samples and analyze data a little over a year ago.

The company’s permit to collect oil and gas waste requires a certain amount of self-testing to verify that the substances collected were indeed the type of waste permitted for disposal.

Glass explains that records seem to indicate that the pit did indeed contain waste from the oil and gas industry which includes BTEX compounds -or volatile organic compounds- typically found in petroleum products, such as gasoline and diesel fuel.

Benzene
Toluene
Ethyl benzene
Xylene

Glass said identifying some of the chemicals contained in the pit will help regulators and scientists know what to look for in the environment to determine any possible contamination.
What was found in the streams around this oil and gas waste site?

Samples were taken from water sources in areas around the pit in those same years.

“It looks generally like some of the key indicators that would be specific to oil and gas,” Glass said, “tend to increase as you move down gradient from the pit on Danny Webb’s site.”

The data shows that the same contents that were found in the pit, were also found in stream samples taken next to the pit, although at lower concentration levels and below the standards set by the safe drinking water act.

This means the pit could have been leaking, but it’s not certain.

Things to remember while analyzing the data

This area of Lochghelly is known to have environmental damage from other industrial activities.

“There was this constant, acid mine-looking flow coming right out of the base of that,” Glass said. “Sometime it was real dark and black and sometimes it was orange, and it was these different colors. And sometimes it was associated with odors.”

“They don’t know that that’s what smelled, but odors would be in the valley there and people would look at that and put the two together. So, that drove some sampling.”

Another challenge in determining possible sources of the contaminants is data itself. It’s not clear where the samples were taken.

“And again these sample locations, they’re not necessarily GPS locations and they’re not related to some significant feature that you can tell about,” Glass said. “They’re just anecdotal, like, ‘next to pit,’ ‘by pit,’ ‘near pit,’ ‘upstream from pit,’ ‘downstream from pit.”

Finally, BTEX chemicals can occur naturally.

“The source of barium, and arsenic, and iron, and aluminum, those are from the geology,” Glass said. “It’s really when we concentrate these things to get really high levels or a fast rate of exposure, that we have toxological effects, and we worry about it. So, oil and gas waste tend to concentrate these natural compounds and their waste.“

However, samples taken in April 2013 showed glycol, which is not naturally occurring and is commonly found in oil and gas waste.

“Just to be fair, at the same time, this is kind of a run-over area, there’s a lot of thing,” he said. “For all I know, there’s some old piece of mining equipment setting up on the stream that has a radiator full of antifreeze, glycols, and it’s leaking out, and that’s what I’m seeing in my results. So you really have to put them in perspective. But what it says is, okay, let’s start sampling for glycols.”

State and Federal Loopholes?

Let’s be clear, the data available to Downstream Strategies did not conclude that the pits were leaking. But Glass says these tests were enough to raise concern and request more testing from the DEP.

Within the past year, the regulatory agency ordered the pit closed and revoked the permit– siting “significant public interest” and “procedural issues”.

The DEP says the dry waste from the above ground pits was taken to the Raleigh County landfill.

On Thursday the DEP Environmental Quality Board will hear arguments from Tom Rist an attorney representing the Natural Resource Defense Council, WV Surface Owners’ Rights Organization, Plateau Action Network, and citizen Brad Keenan. DEP inspectors say that Danny Web was allowed to accept waste while the permit is in the renewal process.

Tom Rist and his clients disagree and say that’s against the law among other challenges to the UIC operation.

Glass says the process seems to be a loophole that skirts public health.

“Yeah, I think you should close that loop,” he said. “You should prepare your application prior to your old one expiring. I don’t really see a reason for a gap between the two.”

The Natural Resource Defense Council says federal law that governs hazardous waste has a loophole for oil and gas waste that was created in 1980’s through an amendment to the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.

The ‘CLEANER Act’ or the `Closing Loopholes and Ending Arbitrary and Needless Evasion of Regulations Act of 2013′ is meant to close that loophole.

DEP reports that solid waste from the pits was taken to the Raleigh County landfill.

Danny Webb Construction did not immediately return our request for comment.