Water Pollution Problems Pervasive with WV Gas Industry

by Duane Nichols on May 26, 2014

WV Route 857 North

WV-DEP files case against area developer

From an Article by David Beard, TheDPost.com, May 23, 2014

MORGANTOWN — The state Department of Environmental Protection (WV-DEP) is asking Monongalia County Circuit Court to assess $25,000 per day penalties against a Morgantown developer for alleged environmental violations at a Cheat Lake-area industrial park.

WV-DEP’s Division of Water and Waste Management filed the “complaint for enforcement” on May 22. It issued 12 notices of violation (NOVs) from Sept. 16, 2010, through May 9, 2013, to defendant LPG Land & Development Corp., based on Fairchance Road (WV Route 857 in Monongalia County).

Paul Panson is LPG’s president. The 18-acre industrial park is sited between Fairchance and the Mon-Fayette Expressway, just north of the Interstate 68 and Mon-Fayette interchange. (The LPG site is a service area for the oil and gas industry.)

An LPG representative said Thursday that management hadn’t seen the complaint yet and couldn’t comment.

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Leak Found at Fayette County WV Frack Waste Site

From an Article by Jessica Lilly, WV Public Broadcasting, May 23, 2014

The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection says there indeed was a leak earlier this month in a pipe carrying oil and gas waste from an above ground pit, to an underground injection well in Lochghelly in Fayette County.

As we reported earlier this week, Danny Webb Construction is working to close and reclaim an above ground pit holding waste from the oil and gas industry, including frackwater.

The WV-DEP confirmed that residents’ concerns about leakage during the process were valid. The WV-DEP says there was a leak earlier this month in a pipe carrying wastewater to an underground injection well on the property.

The state environmental agency says the leak was fixed and the impacted soil was dug up and disposed of in a landfill.

The reclamation work comes months after the DEP ordered the pits closed because the operator needed to update the lining and install a leak detection system.

Danny Webb Construction used the pits to remove sediments before injecting into a UIC or underground injection well. The permit for this well expired in 2012 but was renewed February 2014, only to be revoked in early March.

Since then, the WV-DEP changed the application for this type of well. The changes include a new format structured to look more like the permit applications used by the WV-DEP’s Division of Water and Waste Management, and also inclusion of additional guidance on what is needed for the application.

As of Wednesday the operator had not resubmitted a permit application. Environmental groups and citizen Brad Keenan are appealing the revocation because it appears to allow the operator to continue to collect waste just the same as if the permit were approved. A hearing before the Quality Control Board is set for June 12 at the Charleston WV-DEP office.

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