Shipping TOXIC Radioactive Fracking Waste on OHIO River is APPROVED

[RiverLover]

5. Fracking creates radioactive toxic waste that needs to be disposed of

And Ohio has had millions of gallons of this injected into 240+ injections wells. And now, they're putting some of it right into landfills. Fewer quakes that way.

May 2014



Ohio annually processes thousands of tons of radioactive waste from hydraulic-fracturing, sending it through treatment facilities, injecting it into its old and unused gas wells and dumping it in landfills. Historically, the handling and disposal of that waste was barely regulated, with few requirements for how its potential contamination would be gauged, or how and where it could be transported and stored.

With the business of fracking waste only growing, legislators in 2013 had the chance to decide how best to monitor the state's vast amounts of toxic material, much of it being trucked into Ohio from neighboring states.

But despite calls to require that the waste be rigorously tested for contamination, Gov. John Kasich and the state legislature signed off on measures that require just a fraction of the waste to be subjected to such oversight. The great majority of the byproducts creating during the drilling process – the water and rock unearthed – still do not have to be tested at all.

As well, the legislature, lobbied by the fracking industry, undid the governor's bid to have the testing of the waste done by the state's Department of Health — the agency acknowledged by many to possess the most expertise with radioactive material. The testing is now the responsibility of the Department of Natural Resources, the agency that oversees the permitting and inspection of oil and gas drilling sites, but that has no track record for dealing with radioactive waste.

The legislators acted with little in the way of public debate, and the new regulations they adopted appeared deep inside a 4,000-page state budget bill. As a result, both the measures first proposed by Kasich and those ultimately signed into law have infuriated environmentalists and residents with concerns about the risks of fracking in their state.

A ProPublica review of the legislature's actions shows that just a handful of parties testified before the oversight committees charged with examining the pros and cons of the proposed regulations. And interviews with legislative staffers make clear that the final language of the regulations, including changes that scaled back two measures proposed by the governor, was inserted into the budget bill at the last minute.

And so today, to the surprise of much of the public as well as some elected officials, Ohio's oversight of fracking waste remains much as it had been – limited and controversial.

"It has the potential to leave a toxic legacy that could turn much of Ohio into potential superfund sites," said Alison Auciello of the Food and Water Watch, an environmental advocacy organization....

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/14/fracking-boom-ohio-public-safety_n_5324878.html

If the media was doing its job, everyone would know this.