"In the event that they were not able to comply due to high radioactivity, they would reject the water," Kessy said. "And if we did not have a viable option for it, our operations would just shut down. There is no other option."
It is not clear which treatment plants, if any in New York, are capable of handling such material.
DEC spokesman Yancey Roy said that "there are currently no facilities specifically designated for treating them." He added that the state depends on the drilling companies to make sure there is a legal treatment option for the water, and then reviews those plans.
"The department has not received any permit submissions from the well operators that include details about treatment options for the brine containing NORM," he said. "So we do not know what treatment options are being considered or how effective NORM removal will be."
ProPublica contacted several plant managers in central New York who said they could not take the waste or were not familiar with state regulations.
"We are not set up to take radioactive substances," said Patricia Pastella, commissioner of the Onondaga County Department of Water Environment Protection, which operates the Metropolitan plant in Syracuse, N.Y. "It does present a problem with disposal."
Filtering the water is just one of several problems. Plants that can filter out the radioactive materials are left with a concentrated sludge that has substantially higher radioactivity than the wastewater. Sludge can also collect inside the pipes at well sites, in waste pits and in holding tanks.
Federal laws don't directly address naturally occurring radioactivity, and the oil and gas industry is exempt from federal laws dictating handling of toxic waste, leaving the burden on New York State. New York has laws governing radioactive materials, but the state's drilling plans don't specify when they would apply.
Experts who reviewed the concentrations of radioactive metals found in New York's wastewater said the leftover sludge is likely to exceed the legal limits for hazardous waste and would need to be shipped to Idaho or Washington State, to some of the only landfills in the country permitted to accept it.
Fortuna's Kessy said that's an acceptable cost of doing business. "We'll be willing, of course, to fund the necessary disposal means," he said.
The same may be required of some of the equipment used in drilling, which can eventually emit much higher levels of radiation than the water itself. Louisiana, for example, began regulating radioactive materials after it found radioactive buildup in pipes dumped in scrap yards and in the steel used to build schoolyard bleachers.
But the levels in that state were just one eighth of those measured so far in New York.
"I don't believe anyone has taken a look, seriously, at what the unintended consequences are to dealing with these kinds of materials," said Theodore Adams, the radioactive waste disposal consultant. "It's a unique animal—a unique disposal—and depending on where it is located and who is receiving it, it could have an impact."
ProPublica's Sabrina Shankman contributed reporting to this article.
Abrahm Lustgarten is an investigative reporter for ProPublica, an independent, nonprofit newsroom that produces journalism in the public interest.
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13 Comments
Add CommentThe production zones for oil and gas in Kentucky also have radioactivity, which has resulted in surface contamination across the state. Although considered naturally occurring radioactive material ("NORM"), bringing that to the surface is a problem not widely publicized.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is an ancient and well known issue. Natural radioactive materials are common. How could this be a surprise or unexpected?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe radiation dose is totally trivial compared to what your doctor would prescribe without blinking an eye. Of course the radiation from modern medicine is not okay either.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy don't New York just ask West Virginia how they dispose of their nuclear waste from gas drilling. West Virginia has enough nuclear waste to supply every nuclear power plant in the world...of course, West Virginia keeps that a secret or every state in the union would be flocking to them for nuclear fuel for their reactors.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease get very vocal with your news......nag the media to get you on tv news every day with your news.... Otherwise the majority of Americans do not hear you...! Thank you.
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Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNG wells don't produce that long. Just pump it down an old well back where it came from. If these wells hold NG, they will hold about anything.
If you are worried about these radiation sources, you better stop burning coal as they put out far more either in the air, scrubber of waste pile.
actually just because it came up from underground doesnt mean it goes back down safely. depends if the wells are constructed correctly, the injection is done under safe pressures so that it doesnt fracture rocks, etc. this practice has led to widespread groundwater contamination across the country. look at the Safe Drinking Water Act, Underground Injection Control program sometime. we just don't hear much about this because it's "out of sight out of mind"!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGood heavens, people, this isn't _news_.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNor is it trivial, despite the people who try to dismiss it.
You can look it up.
http://www.google.com/search?q=drilling+pipe+cleaning+radiation+hazard+oil+gas
In addition to radioactivity in the water, the cuttings removed from the Marcellus as they drill will also be radioactive. Where will they be disposed?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisaccording to the data used in the URS Corporations report to NYSERDA dated Sept. 16, 2009 - Water-Related Issues Associated With Gas Production In The Marcellus Shale , the Marcellus shale flowback water is radioactive on 24 ocassions out of 100. This means that the probability is 24 percent which is a large number. The median and maximum alpha and beta radiation of the effluent that will be discarged untreated with regard to radiactivity are 1,414.5, 18,950 and
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1,395 , 7,445 respectively which by more than 3 orders of magnitute exceeds the standards. There are technologies available to remove the radioactive metals, but all these facts are being ignored
It's no wonder NY DEC isn't too interested in this. They are too busy trying to close down the Indian Point nuclear plants (which emit practically no radiation) by forcing them to put in gigantic cooling towers ten times more expensive than the solutions they have allowed for their more ideologically-favored methane plants down the river.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe shales, as a group, that the gas is being "fracked" from are a uranium resource. After WWII the Atomic Energy Commission assessed them as the biggest uranium resource the US had at the time. They aren't being mined because richer deposits were discovered. Its no wonder the water coming up is radioactive - the gas is also. The companies look for the gas by looking for the most radioactive shale. The gas is 5 times more radioactive and may be as much as 80 times as radioactive as regular gas. Using it will expose consumers to far more radioactivity than conventional gas, in some cases more than 1,000 times as much as living next door to a nuclear reactor would expose someone to. I have written an article: http://theenergycollective.com/david-lewis/47970/shale-gas-some-it-hot#comment-8120
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is proof of the folly of those who waste their time and money, to feel superior to others, because deep down they know, they are just like the others, mere mortals.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy not publish and promote OCEANOGENIC POWER of Panama, as they do with the oil pipeline from Canada, the war in oil producing countries, and lately, the ancient, but now is reported as recent: shale gas?
The information provided in this article allows the answer: like them, do not has touched be creative, they need both oil and radioactive substances, for their weapons. Hydropower does not serve to that.
And in the case of other renewable energies, to the promote it, considered that their inadequacy and low reliability, sooner or later, would provoke its ridiculous, and it would be good propaganda to justify the use of all types of carbon for energy, and simultaneously, war and its destructive collaterals business.
Energy independence will be preamble to that, with atomic bombs, we will separate a piece of the earth for each madman? Someone will be thinking about bottling and selling atmosphere, so that later, we have to claim independence of air to breathe?