COLUMBUS, Ohio (CGE) - If you want to dump your garbage - regular or toxic - and your state's disposal fees are too high, go west to Ohio, where affordable fees make it fourth among big garbage importing states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Virginia.
Nw that drilling mile-deep hydraulic wells to unleash trapped oil or natural gas - a process called hydraulic fracking - is expanding in Pennsylvania just as its tightening environmental laws put pressure on drillers to keep so-called frack job wastewater out of surface water, one convenient and less expensive option is to dump it on, and in, Ohio, which in the last six months of 2010 accepted 14.8 million gallons for underground disposal, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported Tuesday, based on best available statistics.
Drillers seeking the natural gas nestled in the layer of sedimentary rock found in eastern North America and named for a distinctive outcrop near the village of Marcellus, New York, are increasing the quantity of fracking waste reaching Ohio sufficient to realize nearly $1 million in fees this year from out-of-state drillers pumping hazardous fluids deep into Ohio.
Ohio accepted 25 percent more fracking wastewater from out-of-state drillers in the first quarter of this year compared to the last quarter of 2010. So much of the toxic fracking wastewater is on its way to Ohio that PTR reporter Timothy Puko said one developer is considering using a rail line covering several hundred miles to transport the
The growing controversy over the process comes from high-pressure injection of more than 4 million gallons of water per well that becomes a toxic brew of chemicals, solids and metals freed from underground. A fifth of the dangerous water breaks through the ground and must be treated either for reuse or disposal.
Like New York before it, Pittsburgh became the first city in Pennsylvania to ban hydrofracking within city limits.
When Pennsylvania's environmental protection agency set stricter standards last August for the amount of solids treatment plants could pump into rivers, drillers started looking for other disposal options.
Pennsylvania has a half-dozen deep disposal wells, as does Ohio, where its underground injection program expects 15 to 25 disposal-well applications in coming months, according Tom Tomastik of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, who told Puko there are already 174 permitted disposal wells with four applications pending. Last year Ohio granted 16 applications, the most in about 20 years.
Puko reported that in the second half of last year, drillers produced 5.3 million barrels -almost as much liquid waste - and started sending more than 6.6 percent of it to Ohio injection disposal wells.
Thirty-nine percent of the 2.4 million barrels of fracking water injected into Ohio disposal wells last fall came from other states. During the first three months of this year, PTR reported that 49 percent came from out of state, according to ODNR's Tomastik.
The great industry secret that most upsets environmentalists, beyond felling trees in remote areas like an Ohio state park and the damage heavy trucks and tankers do to the land, is the undisclosed mixture of chemicals used to do hydraulic fracturing.
Many of the chemicals used in fracking fluid are hazardous chemicals that may cause health risks that range from rashes to cancer, according to reports that said some chemicals are identified as carcinogens, which interrupts hormones and glands in the body that control development, growth, reproduction and behavior in animals and humans.
In May, The No Frack Ohio Coalition, including Ohio Reps. Nickie Antonio, State Representative Mike Foley and State Sen. Mike Skindell, hosted a showing of Gasland, a film by Josh Fox that documents his cross-country odyssey uncovering secrets, lies and contamination. One memorable scene from the film is when a resident of a Pennsylvania town is able to light his drinking water on fire.
According to advocates against fracking, it pollutes ground water, ruins crops, lowers property values, increases traffic, devastates small communities and even causes earthquakes. Notwithstanding these critiques, the technique is exempted from the Superfund Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, and Safe Drinking Water Act, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act and many other environmental regulations. One source said other states are enacting moratoriums to study the detrimental effects of fracking and ensure that regulators get it right.
Ohio, whose new Republican Gov. John Kasich is a proponent of fracking, is moving ahead on it. Kasich has proposed leasing park land for drilling, and his Republican friendly legislature has introduced legislation authorizing ODNR to work on it.
Meanwhile, the New York Times reported on a 2011 study by Congressional Democrats that found, in the process of hydraulic fracturing, "oil and gas companies injected hundreds of millions of gallons of hazardous or carcinogenic chemicals into wells in more than 13 states from 2005 to 2009." The Times' report was based on various leaked EPA documents found that hydraulic fracturing had resulted in significant increases of radioactive material including radium and carcinogens including benzene in major rivers and watersheds. At one site, it said, the amount of benzene discharged into the Allegheny River after treatment was 28 times accepted levels for drinking water.
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