HEADS UP for North Carolina and ALL STATES faced WITH FRACKING!

[KoKo]

As North Carolina Weighs Fracking, Questions Loom on Wastewater


By Jim Malewitz, Staff Writer
A brine injection well in Youngstown, Ohio, where wastewater from hydraulic fracturing was disposed. Coastal communities in North Carolina fear they will become dumping grounds for fracking wastewater if their state lifts a ban on deep well injections. (AP)

RALEIGH, N.C. — State Sen. Bob Rucho wants to unlock North Carolina’s oil and gas resources — and soon. It’s hard to ignore the daily buzz about shale-rich states flush with cash, putting the U.S. on track to become the world’s largest oil producer by decade’s end.

The Republican has sponsored sweeping legislation that would lift the state’s moratorium on unconventional drilling and give the state an October 2014 deadline for crafting regulations. It sailed through the Senate in late February.

“Nothing will get done if you don’t have a timeline,” Rucho said. “We believe we have a significant resource here….The upside potential is tremendous.”

How tremendous is debatable, since researchers recently slashed estimates of the size of the state’s shale deposit. No one can be certain, however, until energy companies set drills whirring and high-pressured water blasting using hydraulic fracturing, the controversial technique known as fracking.

But first, lawmakers and regulators here have plenty of questions to answer, including one that has become a major sticking point: What will happen to millions of gallons of chemical-laced water left behind by drillers?

Wastewater disposal is one of many challenges facing a state with no history of oil and gas production. Even as they move toward lifting the ban, lawmakers here have been busy cobbling together regulations to protect the public and the environment.

“All these questions still have to be answered,” said Rep. Mike Hager, a Republican who chairs the Energy and Public Utilities Committee. “It’s just like an onion; that’s what we found out. There are so many layers to this.”
Coastal Injections?

MORE OF THE MYSTERY AT:



Rucho’s legislation would also overturn a 40-year ban on deep injection wells, which drillers in many states use to pump chemical-laced wastewater thousands of feet below ground.

North Carolina’s geology, however, would leave just one possible dumping ground: the state’s Coastal Plain, a region of ocean side communities far removed from the shale.

The state’s shale deposit lies miles west, in the Piedmont. But it’s doubtful that region’s hard bedrock could absorb the waste. Meanwhile, natural fractures in the rock would make it nearly impossible to predict where injected fluid might travel. Without other options, drillers would likely truck the waste hundreds of miles east and inject it into aquifers beneath the Coastal Plains. Those aquifers are surrounded by more absorbent layers of sands, silts and clays.

The proposal has put coastal Tar Heels on edge, stirring concerns about risks to stressed water supplies and the presence of drilling rigs and trucks hauling wastewater near beach communities. The latter could jeopardize North Carolina’s $24 billion tourism industry.

“There is so little (shale) resources and so much risk,” said Kemp Burdette, executive director of nonprofit Cape Fear River Watch, which advocates for the Eastern North Carolina basin.

http://www.pewstates.org/projects/stateline/headlines/as-north-carolina-weighs-fracking-questions-loom-on-wastewater-85899474416

[byeya]

1. This is the state whose legislature wouldn't allow the use of the term "climate change" and refused

to consider how much of the state would be underwater if sea level rose 3 feet or so. The state is in a bright red phase so I am fearful that they - the legislature and governor - will allow anything the corporations want. It's sad here.

[marions ghost]

2. North Carolina has done some stupid things

but this would be one of the stupidest.

[femmocrat]

3. My sympathies to NC if that is where they are headed next.

We have had our share of nightmares in PA. There are no bounds to their greed. It seems crazy to dispose of the wastewater in that manner. It won't matter to them though. All you can do is organize, fight, and hope you can make it so uncomfortable for them that they will go somewhere else. Good luck to you all.

[DCKit]

4. Nothing to see here, it's just slightly salty water, and it will never come back up.

Sorry folks, but it's my opinion that they're injecting toxic waste into the ground (and getting paid for getting rid of it), to release the gas and oil.

[okaawhatever]

5. The state should require some sort of insurance to cover future clean-up. If this drilling is so

safe, surely there will be a third party insurance company willing to underwrite it. Let the corporate hacks put their money where their mouth is. Run their science by a third party and let's see how they view it.

Also, Hager is a criminal and ALEC owned legislator. I would like to know who paid off his lawsuit from the subdivision he developed.

[Ilsa]

6. I think insurance is a great idea,

But I wonder if clean-up is truly possible. It looks like this toxic waste would kill or contaminate marine life. I wonder if the coastal areas would become superfund sites.

This would be a terrible waste.

[okaawhatever]

7. I was thinking that requiring insurance would reveal the true risks and stop the bill from passing.

I don't know if it could be cleaned up, probably not, but even if the costs were offset by insurance and not paid for, it's better than nothing.

[Ilsa]

8. That's even better than I thought!

Thanks for clarifying that for me. Even a discussion of the insured risk would help get the risk into the conversation in a specific way.

I wish lawmakers had to contemplate living with the results of their polluting agendas, but they'll always have the means to escape it.