Well site during active drilling to the Marcelllus Shale formation in Upshur County, West Virginia, in 2008. Photo copyright West Virginia Surface Owners Rights Organization.
Environmental problems associated with oil and gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale continue to get a lot of attention across the region and in West Virginia.
Just last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency postponed one public meeting on its study of hydraulic fracturing because of worries about the size of the crowd — perhaps 8,000 people or more — expected. EPA is working on plans to reschedule.
In West Virginia, Vicki Smith at The Associated Press did a story about the industry’s complaints regarding a proposal that drillers have to come up with plans and post bonds for repairing any damage they do to small rural roads.
Meanwhile, Pam Kasey of The State Journal reported that the state Division of Highways plans to begin using gas well brine to treat West Virginia highways this winter. Pam explained:
With regard to salts, the agreement sets maximum concentration levels for chloride and sodium and a minimum level for the combination of those salts and calcium — all related to the brine’s freezing temperature.
With regard to other aspects of natural gas well brine, the memo establishes levels for pH, iron, barium, lead, oil and grease, benzene and ethylbenzene.
For each new source of brine to be used on roadways, DOH has to submit an analysis of these criteria to the DEP.
Scott Mandirola of the WVDEP told Pam:
While Mandirola conceded that some brine applied to roadways will find its way to the state’s waters, he said the standards set in the agreement were not aimed at maintaining water quality standards. “What we came up with here is equal to or better than what’s been happening,” he said.
“From a public safety perspective, you have to allow de-icing,” he said. “I wouldn’t necessarily say it outweighs the water quality issues, but in most cases during storm events you’ve got high flow conditions and a lot more dilution available to assimilate the potential contaminants that are used in road salt.”
He noted the agreement establishes application rates aimed at minimizing runoff — 10 gallons per ton for pre-wetting, 50 gallons per lane-mile for anti-icing and 100 gallons per lane-mile for de-icing.
And over at West Virginia Public Broadcasting, Erica Peterson had a piece this morning that was an overview of the controversy over Marcellus drilling:
Marcellus Shale gas drilling is taking off in West Virginia, and a hot spot for drilling activity is Upshur County. Chesapeake Energy has 14 active wells there with more planned.
Just above a two lane highway, at a place called Pritt Mountain, a drilling rig pounds its way deep into the earth. It’s aiming for Marcellus Shale around five thousand feet underground.
Once the drilling is complete, millions of gallons of water and chemicals will be pumped into the well to fracture the shale and release a flow of natural gas that could last 25 to 30 years.
And finally, public interest lawyer Dave McMahon had an op-ed commentary in the Gazette-Mail responding to complaints in a previous Gazette story that West Virginia’s regulatory environment was harming gas development:
It is preposterous for any “regulatory environment” to be discouraging drilling here. West Virginia has only 18 oil and gas inspectors who should visit a new well site five times during drilling to make sure it is being done properly. Between 600 and 2,200 new wells are permitted each year. That limited number of inspectors cannot possibly do those inspections and check on the more than 55,000 active wells that have already been drilled. And the state regulatory process is so far behind that there are probably 19,000 played out wells that the state should order to be plugged to prevent groundwater pollution, but they have not gotten to that. West Virginia lets all this regulation fall behind in order to keep issuing new permits, so our regulatory structure cannot be impeding drilling.
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Welcome to southern West Virginia’s world, nothern part of the state. Get used to it. There will be nothing done about it. The DEP is not here to protect our environment. They are here for permitting only. We’ve been dealing with it for well over 30 years now. This state is bought and paid for. Somehow these coal and gas companies figured out how to do that with taxpayer money! They are a cunning bunch!!!!!
Acute (short-term) exposure to ethylbenzene in humans results in respiratory effects, such as throat irritation and chest constriction, irritation of the eyes, and neurological effects such as dizziness. Chronic (long-term) exposure to ethylbenzene by inhalation in humans has shown conflicting results regarding its effects on the blood
Benzene is known to be responsible for a number of health disorders, and is linked with various types of leukemia amongst other illnesses. In addition to respiratory problems, skin problems, and blood disorders, the cancers that are linked to benzene exposure include acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL), chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML), chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), hairy cell leukemia (HCL), non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL), Hodgkin’s disease, multiple myeloma, myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS)
Scott Mandirola said the agreement between WVDEP and WVDOH for disposing of gas well brines on our roads is not aimed at maintaining WV’s water quality standards. Isn’t this is an odd thing for WVDEP to agree to?
In fact, the agreement requires the roadway brine to be highly concentrated (better for deicing), except that its barium content would be required to be reduced from thousands of ppm to less than 2 ppm. Only the brine’s barium content would be required to meet our water quality standards. So why not also protect our streams’ from what’s left in the brine, after the barium is taken out?
Maybe the answer has to something to do with which contaminants are easily removed. Barium can be precipitated out by mixing in some sulfates. This agreement will help any treatment businesses that can cheaply remove barium from brine, but not other contaminants, such as bromide and radioactivity.
Upshur county has 14? Doddridge county has 44 active wells, 148 permits, Harrison county has 17 active and 177 permits. Guess they go to the poorest counties first dangling that “free gas” and “lots of jobs” issue.
http://blogs.wvgazette.com/watchdog/2009/10/02/what-caused-big-fracking-fluid-spill-in-doddridge-county/
I am planning on doing a Science Fair Project related to this substance that possibly could be used on the roads in this coming winter and I did a project like this two years ago and I want to continue this project. I was wondering who I would have to contact to obtain some of this liquid to run some standarized tests and record some results and get some more information about the solution, like what exactly is known to be in it and what contributes to it’s performance in freezing temperatures.