“To Hell With Us” – Records of Misconduct Found In...

Annual citizen complaints reported to PA DEP compared to the annual number of new unconventional oil and gas wells. © Public Herald “To Hell With Us” – Records of Misconduct Found Inside Pa. Drinking Water Investigations PUBLIC HERALD | Since 2004, when the controversial process known as “fracking” began in Pennsylvania, over 4,100 drinking water complaints related to oil and gas operations have been reported to the...

Fracking brine leak in North Dakota reaches Missou...

Fracking brine leak in North Dakota reaches Missouri River, prompts state Democrats to call for more regulation  Rebecca Jacobson, Inside Energy PBS NewsHour | A pipeline leak near Williston, North Dakota, that began January 6 has spilled 3 million gallons of brine — a byproduct of hydraulic fracturing. The leak has reached the Missouri River, the Associated Press reported on Friday. It’s the largest saltwater spill in the...

30-Month Report Finds Pennsylvania Dept. Environme...

Public Herald Journalists Publish Largest Record of Fracking Complaint Cases in Pennsylvania History After a 30-month analysis, investigative journalists Joshua Pribanic and Melissa Troutman have uncovered 9 ways that officials at the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) have kept drinking water contamination across Pennsylvania “off the books” since fracking began in 2004. Troutman and Pribanic are the co-founders...

These Popular Fruit and Veggie Brands May be Grown...

The practice is gaining popularity in drought-plagued California, but is it safe? Was your California orange irrigated with wastewater from oil wells? Quite possibly yes. Under a 20-year-old water recycling program, wastewater that is generated as a byproduct from oil extraction is treated and sold to some 90 Southern California landowners—including one with certified organic operations—which use it to grow crops such as...

Study: Fracking Industry Wells Associated With Pre...

WASHINGTON — New research from Johns Hopkins University suggests that pregnant women living near fracking wells in Pennsylvania are more likely to give birth prematurely or have high-risk pregnancies. “Now that we know this is happening, we’d like to figure out why,” said Brian Schwartz, lead researcher and a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “Is it air quality? Is it the stress? They’re the...

Cleanup continues after vandalism causes oil to le...

Although cleanup has been underway for three days, the odor of spilled crude oil still marked the site Sunday of last week’s vandalism of an oil well storage tank along Lindentree Road, east of Mineral City.(Ohio) Officials of Dart Oil Co. of Denver, Colorado, which co-owns the oil well site along with Buckeye Oil of Wooster, have told Tuscarawas County Sheriff’s deputies that about 60 barrels (3,300 gallons) of crude oil...

More study needed on fracking, birth link

Researchers analyzed data related to 15,451 babies born in three southwestern Pennsylvania counties from 2007 through 2010, logging birth weight and tracking how close the mother lived to fracking wells. Pregnant women who live close to multiple fracking wells in Pennsylvania were more likely to have babies with lower birth weights than were those who live farther away, a study published on Wednesday shows. University of...

Company fined for dumping fracking wastes in storm...

A judge on Thursday fined the company $75,000 and ordered it to pay $25,000 to be split between Friends of the Mahoning River and Midwest Environmental Enforcement Association. CLEVELAND A northeast Ohio company has pleaded guilty to a federal charge related to the illegal dumping of wastewater from gas and oil drilling into a storm sewer 33 times between October 2012 and January 2013. A judge on Thursday fined the company...

Spill at injection well threatened water supply ne...

Residents in Vienna Township relied on bottled water for a week WARREN Local officials are seeking answers after a chemical spill at an injection well facility threated a northeast Ohio township’s water supply. Inspectors earlier this month traced a chemical spill in Vienna Township to a Kleese Development Associates facility, which operates five saltwater injection wells. Residents in the township near Warren relied on...

Athens County Fracking Action Network appeals K�...

Athens County Fracking Action Network has appealed the recent permitting of the K&H#3 injection well, the third to be drilled on the Torch, Ohio, site owned by Jeff Harper of West Virginia. The latest Athens County radioactive frack waste injection well was permitted last month by Ohio Department of Natural Resources, under Governor John Kasich, in spite of hundreds of appeals from Athens County residents as well as...

National Zero Discharge Pretreatment Limit Propose...

On April 7, 2015, USEPA proposed a zero discharge Clean Water Act pretreatment standard for wastewater from existing or new Unconventional Oil and Gas Extraction (UOG) facilities discharged to a Publicly Owned Treatment Works (POTW).  USEPA states that even though UOG wastewater (.i.e., generated from hydraulic fracturing) is not currently being directly discharged to POTWs, they want no incremental change to industry...

Fracking waste stirs controversy in Athens

TORCH, Ohio — The tractor-trailers arrive at a steady pace, turning off Rt. 50 and climbing a hill to a collection of tall, green metal tanks. The trucks haul long, white tanks that are bare except for a number that identifies their company and one word that has riled a vocal population in Athens County: brine. Brine is another name for the fracking wastewater that bubbles up in oil and gas wells in Ohio, Pennsylvania and...

Four Of 10 Fracked Wells In Pennsylvania Are Proje...

A major new study finds that, as suspected, it is new, unconventional gas wells that are far more likely to leak heat-trapping — and tap-water igniting — methane than older, conventional wells. After examining the publicly available compliance records of more than 41,000 wells in northeastern Pennsylvania, the Cornell-led researchers have dropped this bombshell: About 40 percent of the oil and gas wells in parts of the...

OEPA: 2,000 gallons of waste oil spilled into Vien...

VIENNA, Ohio Workers from Kleese Development were back at two ponds and the Little Yankee Run wetlands on Sodom Hutchings Road on Friday for a second day, cleaning up an estimated 2,000 gallons or more of “light waste oil” from Kleese’s oilfield-services company nearby. The company issued a statement late Friday saying the company was halting all operations at the Sodom Hutchings location, including brine injection “for the...

Figuring Out Fracking Wastewater

Scientists are analyzing the liquid that comes from fracking wells to determine the best ways to treat it. Almost 3 million gallons of concentrated salt water leaked in early January from a ruptured pipeline at a natural gas drilling site near Williston, N.D. The brine, a by-product of the oil and gas extraction method known as hydraulic fracturing, spilled into two creeks that empty into the Missouri River, according to...