Now What? WV Landfill Won't Take More Shipments Of Mildly Radioactive Fracking Sludge From PA [View all]

[hatrack]

Range Resources shipped 12 tons of drilling sludge containing higher than normal radioactivity 100 miles to a West Virginia landfill Tuesday afternoon, but for now won't be able to use it to dispose of similar waste stored on well pads in Washington County.

Kelly Gillenwater, a West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection spokeswoman, said Thursday that Waste Management's Meadowfill Landfill in Bridgeport, just west of Clarksburg, W.Va., has been ordered to stop accepting drilling waste containing radioactivity while the department investigates the shipment.

Range had tried to dispose of the waste at the Arden Landfill, in Chartiers, Washington County, also operated by Waste Management, in early March. But the shipment from the Malinky well pad, in Smith, Washington County, was rejected when it set off alarms at the gate where its radioactivity was measured at 212 microrems, higher than the landfill's 150 microrems limit.

Range Resources spokesmen did not return calls seeking comment. Range spokesman Matt Pitzarella previously said that the radioactivity levels of the waste are not dangerous to workers or residents of the area, and that radiation measurements decline to background levels just feet away from the storage containers. Normal background levels in the area are between six and eight microrems.

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http://www.post-gazette.com/local/region/2014/05/29/West-Virginia-rejects-drilling-waste-tainted-with-radioactivity/stories/201405290267