- APFeb. 13, 2012 : Ray Kemble pumps drinking water into tanks along side his home in Dimock, Pa.
DIMOCK, Pa. – Tugging
on rubber gloves, a laboratory worker kneels before a gushing spigot
behind Kim Grosso's house and positions an empty bottle under the clear,
cold stream. The process is repeated dozens of times as bottles are
filled, marked and packed into coolers.
After extensive testing, Grosso and dozens
of her neighbors will know this week what may be lurking in their well
water as federal regulators investigate claims of contamination in the
midst of one of the nation's most productive natural gas fields.
More than three years into the gas-drilling boom that's produced thousands of new wells, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
and the state of Pennsylvania are tussling over regulation of the
Marcellus Shale, the vast underground rock formation that holds
trillions of cubic feet of gas.
The state says EPA is meddling. EPA says it is doing its job.
Grosso, who lives near a pair of gas wells
drilled in 2008, told federal officials her water became discolored a
few months ago, with an intermittent foul odor and taste. Her dog and
cats refused to drink it. While there's no indication the problems are
related to drilling, she hopes the testing will provide answers.
"If there is something wrong with the water,
who is responsible?" she asked. "Who's going to fix it, and what does
it do to the value of the property?"
Federal regulators are ramping up their
oversight of the Marcellus with dual investigations in the northeastern
and southwestern corners of Pennsylvania. EPA is also sampling water
around Pennsylvania for its national study of the potential
environmental and public health impacts of hydraulic fracturing, or
fracking, the technique that blasts a cocktail of sand, water and
chemicals deep underground to stimulate oil and gas production in shale
formations like the Marcellus. Fracking allows drillers to reach
previously inaccessible gas reserves, but it produces huge volumes of
polluted wastewater and environmentalists say it can taint groundwater.
Energy companies deny it.
The heightened federal scrutiny rankles the
industry and politicians in the state capital, where the administration
of pro-drilling Gov. Tom Corbett
insists that Pennsylvania regulators are best suited to oversee the gas
industry. The complaints echo those in Texas and in Wyoming, where
EPA's preliminary finding that fracking chemicals contaminated water
supplies is forcefully disputed by state officials and energy
executives.
Caught in the middle of the state-federal regulatory dispute are residents who don't know if their water is safe to drink.
EPA is charged by law with protecting and
ensuring the safety of the nation's drinking water, but it has largely
allowed the states to take the lead on rules and enforcement as energy
companies drilled and fracked tens of thousands of new wells in recent
years.
In Pennsylvania, that began to change last
spring after The Associated Press and other news organizations reported
that huge volumes of partially treated wastewater were being discharged
into rivers and streams that supply drinking water. EPA asked the state
to boost its monitoring of fracking wastewater from gas wells, and the
state declared a voluntary moratorium for drillers that led to
significant reductions of Marcellus waste. Yet a loophole in the policy
allows operators of many older oil and gas wells to continue discharging
significant amounts of wastewater into treatment plants, and thus, into
rivers.
The state's top environmental regulator,
Michael Krancer, says Pennsylvania doesn't need federal intervention to
help it protect the environment. He told Congress last fall that
Pennsylvania has taken the lead on regulations for the burgeoning gas
industry.
"There's no question that EPA is
overstepping," Katherine Gresh, Krancer's spokeswoman, told the AP. "DEP
regulates these facilities and always has, and EPA has never before
shown this degree of involvement."
The American Petroleum Institute urged the
Obama administration last week to rein in the 10 agencies it says are
either reviewing, studying or proposing regulation of fracking.
"The fact is that there is a strong state
regulatory system in place, and adding potentially redundant and
duplicative federal regulation would be unnecessary, costly, and could
stifle investment," API Vice President Kyle Isakower said in a
statement.
EPA says public health is its key focus and insists it is guided by sound science and the law.
"We have been clear that if we see an
immediate threat to public health, we will not hesitate to take steps
under the law to protect Americans whose health may be at risk," said
Terri White, an EPA spokeswoman in Philadelphia.
The EPA investigations are being conducted
amid reports of possibly drilling-related contamination in several
Pennsylvania communities.
In recent years, methane migrating from
drill sites into private water supplies has forced scores of residents
to stop using their wells and rely on deliveries of fresh water. Some
residents complain the state agency has failed to hold drillers to
account.
In heavily drilled Washington County, near
the West Virginia border, EPA staff are inspecting well pads and natural
gas compressor stations for compliance with water- and air-quality
laws. In Dimock, a village about 20 miles south of the New York state
line, EPA stepped in after a gas driller won the state's permission to
halt fresh water deliveries to about a dozen residents whose wells were
tainted with methane and, the residents say, heavy metals, organic
compounds and drilling chemicals.
Dimock holds the distinction of being
Pennsylvania's top gas-producing town, yielding enough gas in six months
to supply 400,000 U.S. homes for a year. Some residents contend their
water wells were irreversibly contaminated after Houston-based Cabot Oil
& Gas Corp. drilled faulty gas wells that leaked methane into the
aquifer 7/8 7/8-- and spilled thousands of gallons of fracking fluids
that residents suspect leached into the groundwater.
Cabot first acknowledged, then denied
responsibility for the methane it now contends is naturally occurring.
It also asserts that years of sampling data show the water is safe to
drink.
The EPA looked at the same test results and arrived at a different conclusion.
The well water samples "led us to conclude
that there were health concerns that required action," White said. EPA
said its tests showed alarming levels of manganese and cancer-causing
arsenic and that Cabot's own tests found minute concentrations of
organic compounds and synthetic chemicals, suggesting the influence of
gas drilling.
Cabot says its drilling operations had
nothing to do with any chemicals that have turned up in the water. It
points to a Duke University study last year that found no evidence of
contamination from fracking.
Yet the company racks up state violations at
a far higher rate than its competitors in the Marcellus -- 248
violations at its wells in Dimock alone since late 2007 -- most recently
last month, when the company was flagged for improper storage,
transport or disposal of residual waste. State regulators levied more
than $1.1 million in fines and penalties against the company between
2008 and 2010. And it is still banned from drilling any new wells in a
9-square-mile area of Dimock.
While EPA agreed last month to deliver water
to four homes along Carter Road, the agency said the tests did not
justify supplying water to several other residents who had been getting
their water from Cabot and who have filed suit against the company.
The plaintiffs still don't trust their wells, instead relying on water from the nearby Montrose municipal supply.
Twice a day, six days a week, Carter Road
resident Ray Kemble drives about eight miles to a hydrant in Montrose,
fills a 550-gallon tank strapped to the back of a donated truck, and
delivers water to as many as five homes -- including his own.
Anti-drilling groups are footing the bill, estimated at $500 per week.
Kemble said his well water turned brown and
became unusable in 2008, shortly after the gas well across the street
was drilled and fracked.
At his home, he filled a large plastic container dubbed a water buffalo from the tank on the truck.
"Never had a problem before until Cabot came in," Kemble said.
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