North Dakota: oil producers aim to cut radioactive waste bills

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

North Dakota: oil producers aim to cut radioactive waste bills

BY ERNEST SCHEYDER
WILLISTON, N.D. Wed Jan 28, 2015 11:18am EST

(Reuters) - North Dakota's oil industry is pushing to change the state's radioactive waste disposal laws as part of a broad effort to conserve cash as oil prices tumble.

The waste, which becomes slightly radioactive as part of the hydraulic fracturing process that churns up isotopes locked underground, must be trucked out of state. That's because rules prohibit North Dakota landfills from accepting anything but miniscule amounts of radiation.

The most common form of radioactive waste is a filter sock, a mesh tube resembling a sandbag through which fracking water is pumped before it's injected back into the earth. Tank and pipeline sludge are also radioactive.

It's not clear how much of this waste is generated, as North Dakota officials only began requiring tracking last year; final 2014 reports aren't due until next month. Some put the number at 70 tons per day; others say 27 tons.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/28/us-usa-north-dakota-waste-idUSKBN0L11Z420150128

[Panich52]

1. Like most conservatives these days, ignoring the future

Maybe the figure that if South Dakota can have a Badlands Nat'l Park, turning areas of their own state into 'badlands' is a positive thing.

[caraher]

2. North Dakota's standard is reported in a confusing way

North Dakota's landfills currently can only accept waste with radioactive material up to 5 picocuries, a measurement of the radioactivity found in a gram of material.

A banana has, on average, 3.5 picocuries of radiation.

The reporter should have written that the rule is 5 pCi per gram, rather than suggesting a pCi is somehow ordinarily standardized to a gram. Considering that a typical banana has a mass over 100 grams, the present regulation actually allows waste well over 100 times more radioactive per unit mass than a banana. The writing makes North Dakota's regulation seem insanely overzealous.