BRIDGEPORT, W.Va. — A state environmental official says Marcellus shale drilling sludge dumped at a landfill in Harrison County has a low level of radiation.

Division of Water and Waste Management director Scott Mandirola tells The Exponent Telegram that the sludge contains a fraction of a year’s acceptable radiation exposure for workers.

Mandirola says Waste Management won’t be cited for dumping the sludge at its Meadowfill landfill.

Another Waste Management landfill in Pennsylvania had rejected the sludge.

Mandirola says inspectors with the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection checked the sludge at the Meadowfill landfill with radiation detectors. He says it measured 20 microrems per hour above natural radiation levels.

He says the federally acceptable exposure level for radiation workers is 5 rems per year, or 570 microrems per hour.

Another Voice: Radioactive drilling waste poses a serious threat

By David Kowalski, Buffalo NY News, May 29, 2014

The Marcellus Shale contains radioactive materials, including radium and radon. Normally, the radioactive material is safely buried deep underground. However, shale gas drilling and fracking bring radioactivity in solids and liquid wastewater to the surface, posing a risk to public health if not properly managed.

Radium and radon can cause cancer if ingested or inhaled. Radium causes leukemia and bone cancer. Radon gas is the leading cause of lung cancer in non-smokers.

In 2009, the NY Department of Environmental Conservation found radium levels in Marcellus Shale wastewater that are thousands of times greater than that allowed in drinking water by the Environmental Protection Agency, and up to 267 times the limit for safe discharge into the environment.

Exemptions from key federal regulations allow gas industry solid and liquid waste to pass as “non-hazardous.” However, solid drilling waste from Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale has triggered radiation alarms at landfills. This waste has been imported by New York landfills. Liquid leachate from landfills is sent to waste treatment plants unequipped to monitor or remove radioactive materials, threatening drinking water sources.

Recently, a peer-reviewed scientific paper reported radium levels of 200 times background in Pennsylvania’s Blacklick Creek sediments downstream of a fracking wastewater treatment plant. The gas industry has not identified methods to clean up the wastewater and safely dispose of the radioactive material removed.

The NY-DEC permits the spreading of salty wastewater (brine) on roads for de-icing, dust control and road stabilization as well as on land for dust control. However, because of the possible presence of radioactive materials, such applications of wastewater should not be permitted in the absence of testing for radioactive materials.

Radium and radon in waste from shale gas drilling and fracking pose a serious threat to public health, although the cancers induced can take years to develop. In light of lax monitoring of radioactivity by the industry and the states, as well as the absence of safe methods for waste treatment and disposal, the public should demand that the NY State Legislature pass laws banning this hazardous waste in order to protect our water, land, air and health.

Public input is more important than ever given heavy campaign contributions to state legislators from the natural gas industry.

>>> David Kowalski, Ph.D., is a retired cancer researcher and a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists. <<<

From an Article by Don Hopey / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 27, 2014

Range Resources has confirmed that Marcellus Shale drilling sludge with radioactivity content too high for normal landfill disposal is stored at two more of its drilling pads in Washington County.

Waste containing higher radioactivity levels is being temporarily held by Range at the Melechi pad and the MCC pad in Smith, near Mount Pleasant. Earlier this month, drilling sludge from Range Resources’ Carter drill pad and impoundment in Mount Pleasant was also found to have higher radioactivity readings.

PA-DEP spokesman John Poister said the stored waste doesn’t present a health threat to nearby workers or residents.

In March, Range trucked the drilling waste to the Arden Landfill in Chartiers, Washington County, but the landfill rejected the shipment after it set off alarms at the gate, indicating its higher radioactivity reading, Mr. Poister said.

The DEP said radioactivity levels of the two red metal boxes on the Melechi pad were measured at 212 microrems. Range said the radioactivity level of the MCC pad waste was also at “about 200 microrems an hour.”

Range obtained a Department of Transportation exemption from PA-DEP on March 1 that allowed it to transport the loads back to the pad where they originated.

State oil and gas regulations give Range one year to remove the waste bearing radioactivity from the drill pad sites where it is being stored in large metal containers properly identifying their radioactivity content, but Mr. Pitzarella said he expects disposal of the Melechi waste material this week.

Mr. Poister said the DEP is encouraging landfills to enforce radioactivity rules. “We’ve been talking to landfills and encouraging them to reject loads with radioactivity higher than 150 microrems because we want more thought given to how we handle this and what goes into landfills. It’s something we feel is necessary given the oil and gas boom.”

He said it’s “not uncommon” for wastewater to have picked up natural radiation washed from the underground shale formation. Normal background radiation in the area is between six and eight microrems.

He said Range told the DEP it has not yet determined where the loads of higher radioactivity materials will be disposed. Range must alert DEP 72 hours before the radioactive loads are moved, notify the department of the final disposal site and provide receipts

We have seen good and bad financial times in the U.S. but we always had the option to feed people via agriculture. We at one point could live on very little money because we raised food and livestock. We had options and our land, air and water to fall back on when the all mighty dollar stumbled. With the lack of regulation and environmental issues related to this energy these options may not be there.

Now we have to worry about all of the contaminates brought to the surface and where it is disposed of. In the beginning it was ”Energy Independence” but now there are many companies wanting to export. How does that make us independent?

When our soil, water and air is contaminated where do we farm and who supplies our food? The only real ”Energy Independence” is renewable and there are jobs to follow.

In my opinion we should explore renewable energy, encourage agriculture and recognize our true wealth that is not on paper. Our land, air, and water — these are things money can’t replace, furthermore these are things that made America the land of opportunity.