Photo: J. Henry Fair for Swarthmore CollegeDans l'article écrit par Charles Côté dans La Presse du 30 septembre, on apprend que la ville de Saint-Hyacinthe refuse de traiter les eaux usées produites par les forages à la quête de gaz de schiste: "Le conseil municipal de Saint-Hyacinthe estime «qu'il n'existe pas de garanties suffisantes permettant de s'assurer du contenu réel de l'eau d'après-forage et que des produits chimiques pourraient en faire partie»." La ville de McMasterville a pris aussi la même position. Sage décision, surtout quand on sait que "Le ministère du Développement durable, de l'Environnement et des Parcs (MDDEP) n'exerce pas de supervision directe..."! Source: http://www.cyberpresse.ca/environnement/dossiers/gaz-de-schiste/201009/30/01-4328032-des-villes-ferment-la-porte-de-leur-usine-depuration.php
Très difficile, en effet, de découvrir ce qui ressort de ces forages, surtout au Québec. Mais ce que j'ai découvert au États-Unis est loin de me rassurer! Dans une présentation PowerPoint de la réunion annuelle du Geological Society of America, j'ai pu me rendre compte qu'on avait analysé les produits chimiques inorganiques de 5 "reflus", ou flowback (ou backflow), en plus de compiler 85 analyses chimiques du département de la protection environnementale de la Pennsylvanie et autres.
Les saumures qui ressortent du sol s'avèrent être 10 fois plus salées que l'eau de mer! Pire que çà, quand le puits prend de l'âge, les saumures deviennent de plus en plus salées. Les analyses varient beaucoup d'un puits à l'autre également, et la tenure en éléments radioactifs est aussi variable. Source: http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2010AM/finalprogram/abstract_177647.htm
J'ai aussi trouvé un article paru dans la revue Scientific American qui parle de données venant du Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) de New York qui aurait analysé 13 prélèvements d'eaux usées de forage à des centaines de pieds de profondeur. On a trouvé dans les eaux usées du radium 226, un dérivé de l'uranium, à des concentrations dépassant 267 fois la limite permise aux déversements dans la nature et des milles fois la limite permise dans l'eau potable. Source: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=marcellus-shale-natural-gas-drilling-radioactive-wastewater
Est-ce que nos usines de traitement des eaux usées (égouts) sont équipées pour traiter ces eaux de forage? Il faudrait tout d'abord demander aux payeurs de taxes (les citoyens des municipalités qui financent ces installations publiques) s'ils sont prêt à rendre un tel service aux gazières et aux compagnies de forage qui s'installent si impunément dans nos régions. Et si en effet nos usines de traitement traitent ces eaux de forages, quelle est la qualité des effluents qui se déversent dans les cours d'eau en bout de ligne? Est-ce que quelqu'un surveille ce qui sort à l'autre bout du tuyau?
Parce plus loin, en aval, d'autres municipalités puisent leur eau potable dans ces mêmes cours d'eau pour alimenter les aqueducs de d'autres citoyens. Si l'eau brute est plus sale, plus polluée, plus contaminée, ce sont d'autres citoyens qui devront payer la note pour la rendre potable à nouveau.
Je ne suis pas la seule qui doute de la capacité des usines de traitement des eaux usées municipales à traiter les eaux usées provenant des forages et des fracturations hydrauliques dans le schiste. En voici d'autres:
Monsieur Walter Hang, un toxicologue qui a une compagnie de cartographie des produits toxiques basée à Ithaca, dans l'état de New York. Il dit que les infrastructures actuelles ne sont pas équipées pour accepter le grand volume d'eaux usées et de matières en suspension dans ces eaux générées par une exploitation à plein volume des gaz de schiste. D'après lui, les usines de traitement d'eaux usées qui existent présentement ne peuvent pas traiter adéquatement les fluides hydrauliques à cause de leur haute concentration de produits chimiques et la radioactivité. Source: http://bearmarketnews.wordpress.com/2010/06/13/how-long-will-the-natural-gas-industry-run-amok-in-the-northeast/
Dans le même article, Dusty Horwitt, un consultant sénior du Environmental Working Group (un ONG, leur site ici: http://www.ewg.org/ ) parle de son étude rendue publique en janvier de cette année qui a révélé que les autorités dans plusieurs états où il y a du forage comme en Pennsylvanie et New York ne vérifient pas si les compagnies utilisent du diesel ou d'autres distillats nocifs. Selon son rapport, la concentration de distillats pétroliers dans un seul puits est suffisante pour contaminer 650 millions de gallons d'eau.
Dans la revue spécialisée en ligne Geology.com du U.S. Geological Survey, une institution fédérale des États-Unis, on peut lire: "Les pratiques actuelles de disposition des liquides du Marcellus Shale en Pennsylvanie nécessite qu'ils soient traités dans des usines de traitement d'eaux usées, mais l'efficacité des traitements standards des eaux usées de ces fluides n'est pas bien comprise. En particulier, les sels et autres solides dissous dans les saumures ne sont pas enlevées de façon satisfaisante par le traitement des eaux usées, et des rapports de haute concentration de salinité dans des rivières des Appalaches ont été liés à des déversements de saumures venant du Marcellus Shale." Source: http://geology.com/usgs/marcellus-shale/
Dans une lettre adressée au bureau des permis d'eau du New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, une firme légale de consultants avisait que "les concentrations élevées de TDS (Total Dissolved Solids - totaux de solides dissous) présentes dans cette soure d'eaux usées peut s'avérer être un inhibiteur aux procédés biologiques de traitement des eaux usées. On a noté que les concentrations de TDS dans le reflu et les eaux de fracturation augmentent au fur à mesure que le puits prend de l'âge...Cela revient aux usines de traitement des eaux usées municipales de s'assurer que les volumes et les concentrations des produits chimiques présents dans les eaux de rejets de la fracturation hydraulique n'aient pas d'impacts néfastes sur les procédés de traitement de l'usine." Source: http://www.westfirmlaw.com/pdf/8Dec2008%20letter%20from%20DOW%20to%20POTWs.pdf
Le Docteur Conrad Dan Volz, professeur assistant du Graduate School of Public Health à l'université de Pittsburgh dit: "C'est çà le gros problème. Ils n'ont pas d'analyses de ce qui se trouve dans les eaux usées qui remontent (des forages). Ce qu'ils injectent dans les puits peut changer chimiquement et s'ajouter à ce qu'il y a déjà sous terre, et personne ne dévoile le montant d'arsenic, de manganèse, de cobalt, de chrome et de plomb qu'il y a dedans. Selon les concentrations, cela pourrait devenir des déchêts dangereux."
Les compagnies de forage soumettent des listes de produits chimiques qu'elles ajoutent à l'eau au Département de Protection de l'Environnement (DEP), mais pas les montants spécifiques des mélanges. Quatre des composés chimiques sont des pesticides complexes dont des études scientifiques ont classés comme étant "très toxiques pour les poissons". Les pesticides sont ajoutés aux eaux de forage pour freiner la prolifération d'algues dans les étangs de sédimentation et les citernes à côté des puits de forage. Les algues et d'autres "biofilms" peuvent encrasser les pompes qui injectent l'eau dans le roc. Aucun de ces produits chimiques ne devraient être déversés directement dans des eaux de surface comme une rivière, affirme le Docteur Volz qui étudie les effets des polluants dans les rivières. "S'il y a assez de biocides pour tuer des algues comme on peut le constater dans ce composé bromé, il y en assez pour endommager les poissons. En déverser dans l'eau est tout simplement insensé."
Il ajoute que le formaldehyde, qui est un cancérigène pour les humains, "est toujours inquiétant", mais aucun risque ne peut être évalué sans en connaître les concentrations. En plus des pesticides, les produits chimiques ajoutés aux eaux de fracturation sont entre autres des acides pour diluer le ciment autour des coffrages et ouvrir les perforations dans les tuyaux pour permettre au fluide de passer et entrer dans la formation de schiste (shale). Les réducteurs de friction sont aussi ajoutés pour faciliter le pompage et d'autres produits pour empêcher la glaise de ralentir la circulation du gaz relâché.
Source: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08356/936646-113.stm
Dans le même article, Paul Hart, le président de Pennsylvania Brine Treatment Inc qui est propriétaire de 3 des 6 usines de traitement de l'état et qui veut en construire 6 de plus, se désole: "Les sels sont le plus gros problème en ce moment et la matière la plus dispendieuse à enlever des saumures à hautes concentrations. La formation Marcellus connaît de grandes variations dans les montants de fer, de barium et de sel, et nous avons besoin de savoir les maximums et les minimums analysés pour que nous puissions les traiter, et nous travaillons encore là-dessus. En ce moment, nous n'en savons pas autant que nous aimerions."
La ville de New York avait demandé une étude en impact de la fracturation sur ses sources d'eau potable avant de déclarer un moratoire. Une étude signée Hazen and Sawyer en 2009 intitulée "Impact assessment of natural gas production in the New York City water supply watershed" avertit: "Notre recherche vous prévient d'"énormes volumes" d'eaux usées et il n'y a pas d'usines de traitement dans la région conçues pour traiter ces déchêts." Source: http://s3.amazonaws.com/propublica/assets/docs/rapid_impact_assessment_091609.pdf
ProPublica a traité du sujet dans plusieurs articles, et a parlé à plusieurs personnes. Patricia Pastella, la commissaire du Onondaga County Department of Water Environment Protection qui opère l'usine Metropolitan dans la municipalité de Syracuse dans l'état de New York: "Nous ne sommes pas équipés pour accepter des substances radioactives. C'est un problème pour en disposer."
Un Monsieur Kessy, un gérant de la compagnie Fortuna qui opère 5 des puits qui ont mesurés des pics de radioactivité dans l'état de New York, dit que les niveaux sont les plus élevés qu'il n'a jamais rencontré ailleurs. Des usines de traitement dans l'état de la Pennsylvanie acceptent les eaux usées de Fortuna, mais si les usines ne peuvent pas accepter des concentrations plus élevées, cela causerait des gros problèmes. "S'il s'avère que ces usines ne pourraient pas accepter nos eaux usées à cause des niveaux de radioactivité, ils n'accepteraient pas nos eaux usées, et si nous n'avons pas pas d'autres alternatives, nos opérations devraient cesser. Il n'y a pas d'autres alternatives."
Dans l'article de ProPublica, on dit que ce n'est pas clair quels usines de traitement d'eaux usées dans l'état de New York peuvent accepter ces eaux radioactives. Ce n'est même pas sûr s'il y en a du tout. Le porte-parole du DEC Yancey Roy dit que: "il n'y a pas d'installations conçues pour les traiter en ce moment." Il ajoute que l'état se fie sur les compagnies de forage pour s'assurer que l'on traite ces eaux légalement. "Le département n'a pas reçu de demandes de permis venant des opérateurs de puits qui incluent les détails sur les options de traitement des saumures contenant des NORM (naturally occurring radioactive material - matériel radioactif de source naturelle). Alors nous ne savons pas quelles options de traitement sont regardées ou si elles sont efficaces à traiter les NORM". ProPublica a contacté plusieurs gérants d'usines de traitement dans la région centrale de New York qui disent qu'ils ne pourraient pas accepter ces déchêts et ne sont pas familiers avec les règlements de l'état.
Pour conclure, comme dirait Theodore Adams dans le même article de ProPublica, un consultant en atténuation de radioactivité et en traitement d'eaux usées avec une carrière de 30 ans en déchêts radioactifs: "Çà ne disparaîtra pas tout seul." À la place, la plupart des eaux usées des forages seront traitées par les usines de traitement des eaux usées municipales ou industrielles et seront ultimement déversées dans des cours d'eau publiques. Source: http://www.alternet.org/water/143850/radioactive_wastewater_in_new_york_raises_more_concerns_about_oil_drilling/?page=1
Monsieur Ron Bishop est un biochimiste de SUNY Oneonta, l'université de New York, et il dit: "Même si aucun produit chimique est ajoutée à l'eau par les compagnies gazières, l'eau qui remonte à la surface après une hydro-fracturation d'un puits contient assez de métaux lourds, et est souvent radio-active, pour être considérée comme un déchêt dangereux." Il devrait le savoir, il a aussi travaillé avec des foreurs de puits de gaz. "Mais parce que les exemptions de l'état et fédéraux allouées à l'industrie gazière, elle n'est pas obligée de faire tester l'eau ou la manipuler avec autant de soin qu'elle le serait si elle avait été produite par une autre industrie. "Dans certaines parties de la formation Marcellus, les matériaux radioactifs sont naturellement 250 fois plus élevés que le niveau habituellement règlementé par les agences environnementales, mais les foreurs de gaz naturel ne sont même pas obligé de tester pour la radioactivité." Source: http://www.theithacajournal.com/article/20100223/NEWS01/2230375/1001/news/Spills-of-drilling-chemicals-worry-experts
Dans le même article du Ithaca Journal, Adam Law, un physicien au Cayuga Medical Center qui se spécialise en endocrinologie, affirme que même de petites quantités de certains produits chimiques peuvent agir comme des perturbateurs endocriniens. Une étude sur les composés chimiques de certains fluides utilisés dans la fracturation hydraulique a trouvé que 40% des produits chimiques utilisés sont des perturbateurs endocriniens qui peuvent provoquer des problèmes de santé comme des malformations génétiques, des problèmes de fertilité et des cancers continue Adam Law. Mais faire la preuve de cause à effet est parfois très difficile.
Je peux terminer en traduisant quelques paragraphes d'un autre article paru dans ProPublica.
Les compagnies gazières en Pennsylvanie se débarassent de leurs eaux usées dans les usines de traitement d'eaux usées municipales et dans certaines usines de traitement industrielles, qui après traitements, déversent leurs effluents dans les cours d'eau. L'EPA des États-Unis met en garde ce genre de traitement, parce que ces usines ne sont pas équipées pour retirer les TDS (solides dissous totaux) ou n'importe quel des produits chimiques ces eaux de forage peuvent contenir. Ce qui est encore plus inquiétant, les TDS peuvent nuire le traitement habituel que les usines font aux eaux d'égouts.
En ce moment, aucune usine de traitement des eaux usées de la Pennsylvanie ne possède la technologie pour enlever les TDS, et c'est peu problable que les nouvelles usines qui le pourront seront construites d'ici l'année 2011. La compagnie qui est la plus avancée dans ses soumissions et ses demandes de permis dit que ses usines ne seront pas prêtes avant au moins 2013. Et à sa capacité maximale, cette usine ne pourra traiter que 400,000 gallons d'eaux usées par jour. Le DEP (département de la protection environnementale) aurait besoin de 50 usines de cette taille pour traiter toutes les eaux usées prévues d'ici l'année 2011.
En attendant, le DEP permet aux usines de traitement des eaux usées municipales de continuer d'accepter les eaux usées des forages, même si aucune d'elles ne peuvent enlever les TDS. "Ces usines municipales ne sont pas conçues pour traiter ces déchêts; le DEP s'expose à des problèmes légaux et environnementaux" dit Bruce Baizel, un avocat sénior qui travaille pour le Oil and Gas Accountability Project, un ONG du Colorado qui se spécialise en impacts environnementaux du forage du gaz naturel.
Les directives fédérales déconseillent spécifiquement le traitement des eaux usées des forage par des usines de traitement ordinaires comme le fait la Pennsylvanie présentement, parce que cela pourrait endommager les usines et compromettre les sources d'eau potable. Mais l'EPA laisse la Pennsylvanie faire parce que le DEP a promis de mettre des lois plus sévères en application d'ici 2011. Source: http://www.propublica.org/article/wastewater-from-gas-drilling-boom-may-threaten-monongahela-river
Mais après avoir lu tout cela, qu'est-ce qui se passe ici au Québec? Il y a pourtant eu plusieurs puits de creusés dans notre province depuis quelques années et il s'avère très difficile de savoir qu'est-ce que les compagnies font de leurs eaux usées, qui les analysent et qui les traitent. Seulement quelques questions très importantes toujours sans réponses complètes et satisfaisantes...
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In Quebec, for the past few years, a couple dozen of boreholes have been drilled in the Utica formation, and hydrofracking has been done in some of them to evaluate what volume of natural gas can be extracted from our shale. But what has been done with the wastewater of the initial drilling and the fracking backflow or flowback? Some newspaper articles have come out to say that here in Quebec, no nasty stuff comes out of our shale and it is not radioactive. Some municipal wastewater treatment plants have accepted some of it and assure us they can treat it and dispose of it properly. But all the documentation I have found says otherwise. Here are a few excerpts of what I have found.
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"We analyzed inorganic chemicals in 5 flowback water samples, and we gathered 85 chemical analyses (from the PA Department of Environmental Protection and private sources) of flowback water. The flowback waters are pH 5 to 8 Na/Ca/Cl dominated brines with TDS ranging from 1,850 to 345,000 mg/L (10x more saline than seawater). Flowback water usually shows increased salinity with time. Titrations lacking distinct inflection points suggest, as in oil-field brines, that much of the alkalinity is due to naturally-occurring organic acids rather than HCO3-. Ba and Sr concentrations range widely, with concentrations as high 26,800 and 5,230 mg/L, respectively. Based on r2 values for linear fits, the positive correlations with TDS follow the order: Cl > Na > Ca > Br > Mg ˜ Spec Cond ˜ Sr > Hardness > K ˜ Li. SO4, acidity, and alkalinity range from 5 to 2920, -210 to 1230, and 24 to 800 mg/L, respectively and show no correlation with TDS. Although few data are available, these waters have a wide range of radioactive constituents, with gross alpha and 226Ra as high as 19,200 and 4,180 pCi/L. Durov diagrams comparing major cation/anion constituents, pH, and TDS are presented, as are spatial distribution maps of 15 parameters for flowback water collected at > 90 days after hydrofracturing."
From a powerpoint in an annual meeting of the Geological Society of America:
http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2010AM/finalprogram/abstract_177647.htm
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"The information comes from New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation, which analyzed 13 samples of wastewater brought thousands of feet to the surface from drilling and found that they contain levels of radium 226, a derivative of uranium, as high as 267 times the limit safe for discharge into the environment and thousands of times the limit safe for people to drink."
In a Scientific American article: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=marcellus-shale-natural-gas-drilling-radioactive-wastewater
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"DEC's environmental impact statement also focuses on the state's concern about relying on municipal plants to treat the fluid. "Salts and dissolved solids may not be sufficiently treated by municipal biological treatment and/or other treatment technologies which are not designed to remove pollutants of this nature," it states.
Mr. Sligar said the plant's pretreatment program helps determine how the fluid will affect the digester's bacteria, and what the water is expected to contain when it is discharged into the river. "Of the approximately 600 municipal wastewater treatment plants in the state, there are about 100 with pretreatment programs," Mr. Sligar said. "The EPA has passed some very specific regulations concerning these pretreatment requirements that will prohibit plants from accepting anything that will interfere with the anaerobic processes or cause undue safety hazard to the plant."
ProPublica, a nonprofit for-hire journalism group, contacted 109 of the 135 plants in New York listed by DEC as having the ability to treat the fluid and found that operators from only three have any interest in accepting it. Of the dozen out-of-state plants listed by DEC, nine have reached their capacity and will not take any more flowback fluid, ProPublica reported."
Source: http://www.allbusiness.com/environment-natural-resources/environmental/13755698-1.html
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"New York's Department of Environmental Conservation took a stab at addressing the wastewater problem in the draft environmental impact statement (EIS) on gas drilling it released in September. The report said the DEC won't issue drilling permits until companies prove they can dispose of the water. The report also listed three disposal options: Injecting it into underground storage wells, trucking it to specialized treatment plants in nearby states, or having it processed at sewage plants in New York.
But ProPublica has found that none of these methods are realistic.
Of the 135 New York plants listed in the report, only a tiny fraction can or will accept Marcellus Shale wastewater. ProPublica interviewed spokespeople for 109 of those plants and found that just three have any interest in accepting the water -- and only in small amounts. New York City's 14 treatment plants, whose operators declined to talk to ProPublica, are already running at capacity -- and often over it -- which means they too are unlikely wastewater recipients.
Of the 11 out-of-state plants the DEC listed as options, nine can't take any more wastewater. Two declined to answer questions for this story.
Of the six injection wells (PDF) that operate in New York, only one is licensed to accept oil and gas wastewater. It's owned by Lenape Resources Inc., which uses it exclusively for wastewater from its own gas fields."
http://www.propublica.org/article/drill-wastewater-disposal-options-in-ny-report-have-problems-1229
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"Walter Hang, a toxicologist who runs a web-based toxics mapping company in Ithaca, New York, worries that the current infrastructure can’t handle the scale of these operations. “Anytime you have industrial activity, you’re going to have problems — there’s no way around it,” he says. “You have tremendous volumes of wastewater, you have thousands of truck trips, and it’s really heavy-duty.” Hydrofracking requires millions of gallons of chemically treated water to be on site at all times. And wastewater plants can’t handle fracking fluids properly, says Hang, because there is such a high concentration of chemicals and radioactivity."
"With staff stretched so thin, it’s nearly impossible to get the job done well, says Dusty Horwitt, a senior counsel for the Environmental Working Group. In January (2010) Horwitt released a study warning that regulators in several drill states — including Pennsylvania and New York — don’t check to see if companies are using diesel or other harmful distillates. He also found that many state EPA officials are unclear on the stipulations surrounding fracking regulation. In many cases, the report estimates, the concentration of petroleum distillates used in a single well could be enough to contaminate 650 million gallons of water — the same amount consumed daily by New York City residents. In a worst-case scenario, the amount of distillates in a well could be enough to pollute more than 10 billion gallons of water. When a well is fracked—each well is generally fracked up to ten times — between 15 and 40 percent of the mix flows back to the surface. Companies operating in the Marcellus, which is naturally radioactive, must find a way to dispose of thousands of gallons of water, toxic chemicals, brine and radium. There are several ways things can go wrong, Horwitt says. Fluids can be spilled during transport, they can travel underground through natural or man-made fractures, or they can contaminate nearby areas if they’re not stored properly."
Source: http://bearmarketnews.wordpress.com/2010/06/13/how-long-will-the-natural-gas-industry-run-amok-in-the-northeast/
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"The current disposal practice for Marcellus Shale liquids in Pennsylvania requires processing them through wastewater treatment plants, but the effectiveness of standard wastewater treatments on these fluids is not well understood. In particular, salts and other dissolved solids in brines are not usually removed successfully by wastewater treatment, and reports of high salinity in some Appalachian rivers have been linked to the disposal of Marcellus Shale brines (Water and Wastes Digest, 2008)." Source: http://geology.com/usgs/marcellus-shale/
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"Please note that the high concentrations of TDS present in this source of wastewater may
prove to be inhibitory to biological wastewater treatment processes. It has been noted that the
concentrations of TDS in the return and process water increase over the life of the well. The
expected concentrations of TDS for both the initial hydrofracturing return water as well as for
the ongoing well operation should therefore be considered in the development of the headworks
analysis. lt is incumbent upon the POTW to determine whether the volumes and concentrations
of chemicals present in the hydrotracturing rettun water would result in adverse impacts to the
facility‘s treatment processes as part ofthe above headworks analysis."
Bureau of Water Permits
Division of Water, NYSDEC New York State Department of Environmental Conservation:
http://www.westfirmlaw.com/pdf/8Dec2008%20letter%20from%20DOW%20to%20POTWs.pdf
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"The research also warned of "enormous volumes" of wastewater and said there are no treatment plants in the region designed to treat these wastes. "
Hazen and Sawyer. 2009. Impact assessment of natural gas production in the New York City water supply watershed. New York: New York City Department of Environmental Protection. http://s3.amazonaws.com/propublica/assets/docs/rapid_impact_assessment_091609.pdf
source: http://www.propublica.org/article/gas-drilling-vs-drinking-water-new-york-city-fight-with-albany
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"fluid in a municipal landfill has not been fully evaluated by NYSDEC"
pdf: http://www.state.nj.us/drbc/dockets/stone-energy/RadioactiveWasteManagement.pdf
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""That's not what these municipal plants are designed to handle -- the DEP is inviting legal problems as well as environmental problems," said Bruce Baizel, a senior attorney for the Oil and Gas Accountability Project, a Colorado-based nonprofit that focuses on the environmental impact of natural gas drilling throughout the United States."
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09277/1002919-113.stm
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"It is not clear which treatment plants, if any in New York, are capable of handling such material.
DEC spokesman Yancey Roy said that "there are currently no facilities specifically designated for treating them." He added that the state depends on the drilling companies to make sure there is a legal treatment option for the water, and then reviews those plans.
"The department has not received any permit submissions from the well operators that include details about treatment options for the brine containing NORM," he said. "So we do not know what treatment options are being considered or how effective NORM removal will be."
ProPublica contacted several plant managers in central New York who said they could not take the waste or were not familiar with state regulations.
"We are not set up to take radioactive substances," said Patricia Pastella, commissioner of the Onondaga County Department of Water Environment Protection, which operates the Metropolitan plant in Syracuse, N.Y. "It does present a problem with disposal."
Filtering the water is just one of several problems. Plants that can filter out the radioactive materials are left with a concentrated sludge that has substantially higher radioactivity than the wastewater. Sludge can also collect inside the pipes at well sites, in waste pits and in holding tanks.
Federal laws don't directly address naturally occurring radioactivity, and the oil and gas industry is exempt from federal laws dictating handling of toxic waste, leaving the burden on New York State. New York has laws governing radioactive materials, but the state's drilling plans don't specify when they would apply.
Experts who reviewed the concentrations of radioactive metals found in New York's wastewater said the leftover sludge is likely to exceed the legal limits for hazardous waste and would need to be shipped to Idaho or Washington State, to some of the only landfills in the country permitted to accept it."
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=marcellus-shale-natural-gas-drilling-radioactive-wastewater&page=4
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"An analysis of wastewater samples by the Department of Health found levels of radium-226, and related alpha and beta radiation that are up to 10,000 times higher than drinking water standards, according to a memo the agency sent to the Department of Environmental Conservation. That means the DEC will have to do more testing to identify drilling sites that pose radiation risks, and ensure hot drilling waste is handled and disposed of properly, according to records from the state.
Radioactivity of these components can vary from site to site, the health department reports. Three samples tested ranged from 14,530 to 123,000 picocuries of radiation per liter. The federal limit for radiation in public drinking water is 15. The state's answer for the radioactivity issue boils down to this: Testing and necessary precautions will address the problem. If radioactivity exceeds guidelines, waste will be required to be shipped to a licensed facility out of state."
http://www.theithacajournal.com/article/20091206/NEWS01/912060349/Tests-show-high-concentration-of-radioactive-waste-in-Marcellus
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"With drilling companies poised to sink thousands of wells in Pennsylvania, state environmental officials worried that its waterways would become overwhelmed with pollutants. They began writing the new rule last year. Conventional sewage treatment plants and drinking water treatment plants are not equipped to remove the sulfates and chlorides in the brine enough to comply with the rule.
In addition, the chlorides can compromise the ability of bacteria in sewage treatment plants to break down nitrogen, which can be toxic to fish, environmental officials say. Currently, a portion of the massive amounts of brine being generated by well drilling is entering the state’s waterways through sewage treatment plants, and that flow would be unaffected by the rule.
Once the rule takes effect, a treatment plant would have to get state approval to process additional amounts of drilling wastewater beyond what it already is allowed, or ensure that it was pretreated by a specialized method that removes sulfates and chlorides."
http://www.timesleader.com/news/hottopics/shale/Drilling_wastewater_rule_gets_vital_Pa__approval_06-17-2010.html
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""That's the bigger issue. They don't have an analysis of what's in the waste water they're pulling out," said Dr. Conrad Dan Volz, assistant professor in the Graduate School of Public Health at the University of Pittsburgh. "What they're putting into the wells can chemically change and be added to underground, and no one is saying how much arsenic, manganese, cobalt, chromium and lead is in the stuff. Depending on the concentration, it could be a hazardous waste."
Some of the waste water is taken to DEP-approved municipal sewer authorities that dilute it with their regular effluent before discharging it into a river or stream. Some is trucked to one of the state's six industrial water treatment facilities, where metals, oils and some dissolved solids are removed but where waste salts are a disposal problem exacerbated by the volume of the waste water. "The salts are the biggest issue right now and the most expensive thing to remove from the highly concentrated brines," said Paul Hart, president of Pennsylvania Brine Treatment Inc., who owns three of the state's six industrial treatment facilities and wants to build six more. "The Marcellus has wide variations in the amount of iron, barium and salt, and we need to know the high and low marks so we can treat it and we're still determining that," he said. "Right now we don't know as much as we'd like to know."
The drilling companies provide the DEP with lists of chemicals they add to the water but not the amounts of specific mixtures, claiming that is proprietary information. Four of the chemical compounds are complex pesticides that scientific assessments have determined are "very toxic to fish." One, 2.2-Dibromo-3-nitrilopropionamide, retards fetal development in rabbits. The pesticides are added to the drill water to stop the growth of algae in temporary holding ponds and tanks built next to the drilling pads. Algae and other "biofilms" can foul pumps used to push the water underground and into the shale. None of those chemicals should be discharged directly into surface water such as the Monongahela River, said Dr. Volz, who is studying the effects of pollutants in the rivers. "If there's enough biocide to kill algae, by the looks of this bromated compound there's enough to do damage to fish," Dr. Volz said. "Throwing it in the water is just crazy."
He said formaldehyde, which is a human carcinogen, "is always a concern," but any risk is impossible to assess without knowing its concentration. In addition to the pesticides, the chemicals added to the well "fracing" water include acids to dissolve cement around the pipe casings and open perforations in the pipe for the water to flow through and into the shale formation; friction reducers to make pumping easier; and additives to keep clay from reducing the flow of the released gas.
Different pumping companies use different frac-fluid recipes and formulas and different combinations and amounts of those chemicals."
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08356/936646-113.stm
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"Even with no additional chemicals added by gas companies, the water that flows back from hydro-fracked wells has enough heavy metals -- and often radioactivity -- to be classified as hazardous waste, said Ron Bishop, a biochemist at SUNY Oneonta who has also worked in construction with gas drillers. But because of state and federal exemptions granted to the natural gas industry, the water does not have to be tested or handled as carefully as it would be if it were created by another industry, Bishop said. In some parts of the Marcellus Shale, radioactive materials occur naturally at levels 250 times the level normally regulated by environmental agencies -- but natural gas drillers aren't even required to test for radioactivity, he said.
The precautionary principle in science and medicine asserts that if an action could cause severe, irreversible harm, the burden of proof is on those who want to carry out the action, said Thomas Shelley, a chemist and chemical safety and hazardous materials specialist. Based on this principle, the European Union has banned use of hundreds of chemicals that are used across the U.S., Shelley said.
Even tiny amounts of some chemicals can act as endocrine disruptors, said Adam Law, a physician at Cayuga Medical Center who specializes in endocrinology.
One study on the chemical makeup of some fluids used in hydrofracking determined that more than 40 percent of the chemicals used are endocrine disruptors, which can cause things like birth defects, reproductive problems and cancer, he said. Tracing a cause of endocrine disruption is sometimes extremely difficult -- in the case of one medication frequently given to pregnant women a generation ago, the negative health effect appeared in their children, who developed extremely unusual tumors."
http://www.theithacajournal.com/article/20100223/NEWS01/2230375/1001/news/Spills-of-drilling-chemicals-worry-experts
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"Gas drilling companies currently dispose of their wastewater in Pennsylvania’s municipal sewage plants and in some industrial treatment plants, which then discharge it into rivers and streams. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency warns against this form of treatment, because the plants aren’t equipped to remove TDS or any of the chemicals the water may contain. Of even more concern, TDS can disrupt the plants’ treatment of ordinary sewage, including human waste.
Currently, no plant in Pennsylvania has the technology to remove TDS, and it’s unlikely that new plants capable of doing so can be built by 2011. The company whose bid is furthest along in the permitting process says its plant won’t be ready until at least 2013. And at its peak that plant would be able to treat only 400,000 gallons of wastewater a day. The DEP would need 50 plants that size to process all the wastewater expected by 2011.
In the meantime, the DEP is allowing municipal sewage plants to continue taking drilling wastewater, even though none of them can remove TDS. "That’s not what these municipal plants are designed to handle – the DEP is inviting legal problems as well as environmental problems," said Bruce Baizel, a senior attorney for the Oil and Gas Accountability Project, a Colorado-based nonprofit that focuses on the environmental impact of natural gas drilling.
Federal guidelines specifically recommend against sending drilling wastewater to ordinary sewage plants, as Pennsylvania is doing now, because it might damage the plants and taint drinking water supplies. But the EPA approved Pennsylvania’s plan, because the DEP promised to have more aggressive regulations in place by 2011.
Gas drilling companies currently dispose of their wastewater in Pennsylvania’s municipal sewage plants and in some industrial treatment plants, which then discharge it into rivers and streams. Note: Pennsylvania’s industrial treatment plants, like its municipal plants, are not equipped to remove total dissolved solids or TDS, the substance that is the focus of this story."
http://www.propublica.org/article/wastewater-from-gas-drilling-boom-may-threaten-monongahela-river
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"The information comes from New York's Department of Environmental Conservation, which analyzed 13 samples of wastewater brought thousands of feet to the surface from drilling and found that they contain levels of radium-226, a derivative of uranium, as high as 267 times the limit safe for discharge into the environment and thousands of times the limit safe for people to drink.
The letter warned that the state may have difficulty disposing of the drilling waste, that thorough testing will be needed at water treatment plants, and that workers may need to be monitored for radiation as much as they might be at nuclear facilities. What scientists call naturally occurring radioactive materials -- known by the acronym NORM -- are common in oil and gas drilling waste, and especially in brine, the dirty water that has been soaking in the shale for centuries. Radium, a potent carcinogen, is among the most dangerous of these metals because it gives off radon gas, accumulates in plants and vegetables and takes 1,600 years to decay. Geologists say radioactivity levels can vary across the Marcellus, but the tests taken so far suggest the amount of radioactive material measured in New York is far higher than in many other places.
The state took its 13 samples -- 11 of which significantly exceeded legal limits -- between October 2008 and April 2009. The DEC did not respond to questions about whether additional sampling has begun or whether the state would begin issuing drilling permits before the radioactivity issues are resolved. The DEC told ProPublica it did not know where the wastewater would be treated.
"It's got to go somewhere," said Theodore Adams, a radiation remediation and water treatment consultant with 30 years of experience with radioactive waste. "It's not going to just go away."Instead, most drilling wastewater is treated by municipal or industrial water treatment plants and discharged back into public waterways.
The radium-laden wastewater would almost certainly need to be carefully treated by plants capable of filtering out the radioactive substances. Kessy, the Fortuna manager, which operates five of the wells with spiked readings in New York, said the levels are higher than he has seen elsewhere. Treatment plants in Pennsylvania are accepting Fortuna wastewater with much lower levels of radioactivity from the company's wells there, Kessy said, but if plants can't take the higher concentrations, it could be crippling.
"In the event that they were not able to comply due to high radioactivity, they would reject the water," Kessy said. "And if we did not have a viable option for it, our operations would just shut down. There is no other option."
It is not clear which treatment plants, if any in New York, are capable of handling such material.
DEC spokesman Yancey Roy said that "there are currently no facilities specifically designated for treating them." He added that the state depends on the drilling companies to make sure there is a legal treatment option for the water, and then reviews those plans.
"The department has not received any permit submissions from the well operators that include details about treatment options for the brine containing NORM," he said. "So we do not know what treatment options are being considered or how effective NORM removal will be."ProPublica contacted several plant managers in central New York who said they could not take the waste or were not familiar with state regulations.
"We are not set up to take radioactive substances," said Patricia Pastella, commissioner of the Onondaga County Department of Water Environment Protection, which operates the Metropolitan plant in Syracuse, N.Y. "It does present a problem with disposal."
Filtering the water is just one of several problems. Plants that can filter out the radioactive materials are left with a concentrated sludge that has substantially higher radioactivity than the wastewater. Sludge can also collect inside the pipes at well sites, in waste pits and in holding tanks.
Federal laws don't directly address naturally occurring radioactivity, and the oil and gas industry is exempt from federal laws dictating handling of toxic waste, leaving the burden on New York state. New York has laws governing radioactive materials, but the state's drilling plans don't specify when they would apply.
Experts who reviewed the concentrations of radioactive metals found in New York's wastewater said the leftover sludge is likely to exceed the legal limits for hazardous waste and would need to be shipped to Idaho or Washington, to some of the only landfills in the country permitted to accept it."
http://www.alternet.org/water/143850/radioactive_wastewater_in_new_york_raises_more_concerns_about_oil_drilling/?page=1
It is very hard for me to believe that drilling just a little further up north in the same Appalachian Basin, these same problems are not encountered at all! Show me the independent, scientific proof, Quebec!
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