Marcellus Waste Injection
Preston County Well May Be Turned Into Deep Well Injection Site
News from Andrew Clay, WBOY 12 News, February 12, 2014
An old Energy Corporation of America gas well in Masontown may become a deep well injection site for toxic materials. That concerns some Preston County Residents. “Disposal of waste like this is not in the best interest of the residents of Preston County,” said Preston County resident Jim Sconyers.
Wednesday morning several residents represented more than 800 signatures on a petition telling the county commission that it doesn’t want a deep well injection site 500 feet from Deckers Creek. “I don’t think their unreasonable requests to show an awareness to what could possibly happen to a water source that is located so close to something that could be hazardous or could not be,” said commissioner Vikki Cole.
Residents are concerned about possible leaks, spills and the risks that are involved with trucking mass quantities of chemicals across the county. Pointing a finger to what’s happening in Kanawha County. ”We just had the disaster in Charleston, and if that’s not a wake up call of what can happen,” said Sconyers. “One good spill, one good leak can cause havoc, everyone lives down stream from somewhere.”
Residents are also worried about the millions of dollars already dumped into the creek repairing it from acid mine drainage. County commission president Craig Jennings said we wouldn’t support a blanket “no” on the subject, but would be interested researching the risks, and possibly creating some sort of policy to help protect the county’s water resources.
The Commission said the concern warrants further research. “I think in this day and age with technology and all, you can be more prepared before the industry really, really booms to deter from any type of hazards,” said Cole.
ECA has not applied for a permit for the project. It said in a statement emailed to 12News that it’s still exploring its options with regard to the site, adding that any plans to create an injection well would likely include containment for 110 percent containment. You can read the full comment below:
“At this point, we are simply conducting exploration activities to determine if the project is worth pursuing. Initial results showed that the existing well is a very strong candidate for conversion to an injection well, so we are exploring this opportunity further. Once we complete the exploratory phase of the project, we will determine at that time, how to move forward. As we have not yet finished the exploratory phase of the project, any specific questions about the project are premature, but we are confident that any concerns would be very manageable.
While we are still in the exploratory phase of the project, I can tell you that we would have multiple levels of containment in place to avoid any spills or other discharge to the environment. We are still developing specific plans, but we envision 110 percent containment on site – which means there would be more containment in place than storage capacity.
We do not yet know what the project may look like, but what I can tell you is that ECA has a great environmental record and, like all of our projects, we are committed to pursuing this potential project with the same high standards and commitment to safety we have when we pursue all of our projects. Therefore, multiple safeguards and containment systems would be in place to avoid any potential releases to the environment. We also would have safeguards in place to automatically shut down the well should any weakness be detected in the wellbore. During the exploratory phase, we have been assessing the integrity of the casing of the well and will only proceed with the project if the casing proves to be entirely competent and the well a viable candidate.
In addition, we would conduct extensive water testing to establish a water quality baseline. We also would be conducting regular and extensive monitoring throughout the life of the project to ensure there is no impact to the watershed. Should the monitoring show an adverse effect relating to the well – we would be notified immediately and respond accordingly to ameliorate the situation.”
Jennifer C. Viewe, Energy Corporation of America Community Relations
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PA Injection well fight packs township meeting
By: Deven Clarke, WJAC-TV, February, 13, 2014
HIGHLAND TOWNSHIP, Pa. — Residents of this Elk County township are fighting a proposed, and EPA approved, Marcellus Shale waste injection well. Elk County is just north of Interstate 80, north of Pittsburgh, and contains part of the Allegheny National Forest.
Residents packed the Highland Township supervisor meeting Wednesday night to express their outrage that the well could be coming to their neighborhood. They said it will be put within a mile of the James City area drinking water supply.
It was earlier this month that the federal EPA approved the drilling permit to Seneca Resources to inject waste from natural drilling operations deep into the ground. Residents said they fear the waste will leak into ground water and eventually making its way into their drinking water.
Members of the community want to know why Highland Township officials passed an ordinance and why that ordinance won’t block the injection well. The ordinance was passed before EPA approved the well.
“One of the things they said is that they think it’s an impermissible use of the township’s police powers to protect public safety,” said Chad Nicholson from the Environmental Legal Defense Fund. “And that the township can’t use its police power through making law in this way.”
Township supervisors said they plan to appeal the permit. They said it could take up to six months for the EPA to answer.
http://www.wjactv.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/injection-well-fight-packs-township-meeting-1640.shtml#.Uv2Xtmt5mSM
The quote from Vicki Cole in the WBOY transcript is not correct. She said that she thought our requests were not unreasonable.
This is a very pro-business Commission, dominated by Craig Jennings. He said that anywhere in Preston County you will be impacting streams and that the waste has to go somewhere. He is in favor of Preston County hosting waste disposal and was in favor of the drilling waste landfill that was proposed in Bruceton Mills several years ago.
EPA approves permit for Brady Twp. injection well
From the DuBois Courier Express, February 13, 2014
The Environmental Protection Agency has granted a permit for a disposal well in Brady Township that generated widespread opposition when it was proposed in 2012.
The site will be used to store and dispose of the liquid leftovers from the drilling process used to extract natural gas from the Marcellus Shale layer.
Windfall Oil & Gas of Falls Creek applied for the permit to build the injection well at a site just off Highland Street in Brady Township near the DuBois City line.
In announcing its decision, the EPA posted a 13-page summary of the permit requirements and a 16-page summary of its findings with respect to concerns raised by residents during public hearings and subsequent comment periods.
Those concerns included the well’s proximity to water supplies and the potential for contamination, the EPA’s jurisdiction, the safety of the well and the potential for it to induce earthquake activity around the site.
The announcement comes a week after the EPA issued a permit to Seneca Resources for a similar injection well in Highland Township, Elk County.
According to previously published stories, the Brady Township site would be used to store brine water that is extracted from deep wells drilled for Marcellus Shale gas. Once the water has been used in the hydraulic fracturing process, it is often transported to another deep well where it is pumped for storage.
Residents in the immediate area as well as Brady and Sandy townships, the City of DuBois and the DuBois Area School District stated their opposition to the well as a result of its proximity to homes and municipal water supplies.
At a public hearing in Luthersburg in December 2012, Windfall Oil & Gas President Mike Hoover said, “I was born and raised in this community and I intend to stay here. I truly wouldn’t be proposing this if I thought it was going to pose a health hazard to anybody.
“The process is not complicated at all. We bring trucks in, we load them into tanks filled with the fluid and pump it down the hole,” Hoover said. “There will never be any more pressure exerted on that formation that will either initiate new fractures or extend existing fractures.”
The fluid will be stored in steel tanks and all piping in the process is steel as well. The pumps will have safety shutdown features. The facility will be manned during injection operations.
“There will be cement containment wells around the facility that will be designed to hold 1 1/2 times the stored volume on location,” Hoover said.
Windfall would be responsible for monitoring pressure, flow rate and volume continually to be reported to EPA annually and would conduct a mechanical integrity test once every two years and a pressure fall-off test annually.
The EPA said that after the public hearing and an additional comment period in 2013 to address seismicity issues, “Based on all of the public comments received, EPA is issuing a final permit to Windfall Oil and Gas. The final permit has an added provision in Part II, Section C.2 which requires the automatic shut down of injection in the event that the well incurs a mechanical integrity failure.”
The final permit and the EPA’s response to comments can be found online at, respectively,
http://www.epa.gov/reg3wapd/pdf/public_notices/WindfallResponsivenessSummary.pdf and
http://www.epa.gov/reg3wapd/pdf/public_notices/WindfallFinalPermit.pdf
The response to summary comments also describes the procedure for appealing the permit decision. A petition for review of the permit must be filed within 30 days of the date of this notice – Feb. 14, according to the EPA.
Anyone interested in further information regarding the decision may contact Stephen Platt by email at platt.steve@epa.gov or by telephone at (215) 814-5464.
Source: http://www.thecourierexpress.com/content/tncms/live/