Ohio Environmental Law Blog
Huge Increase in Disposal of Frac Water in Ohio Deep Wells
An article in the Akron Beacon Journal discusses a study by Kent State University regarding the disposal of flow back water from natural gas fracking in deep wells in Ohio. Flow back water is the water that comes back up from fracking a natural gas well. The flow back water is considered wastewater.
A prior post discussed the issues Pennsylvania was facing in handling disposal of flow back water. As a result of increased regulations in Pennsylvania, the main method of disposal of flow back water had become shipment to Ohio for disposal in deep wells. Ohio has 179 permitted deep wells. Pennsylvania has five permitted deep wells.
Here are some of the key statistics from the study as discussed in the ABJ article:
The volume of Marcellus wastewater has grown 570 percent from 2004 to 2011 due to increased shale gas production in Pennsylvania, Lutz said.
Pennsylvania has about 6,400 Marcellus shale wells that have been drilled and another 3,500 that have been permitted. In comparison, Ohio has about 500 wells permitted in the Utica shale, of which 200 have been drilled.
Lutz said Pennsylvania generated about 20 million barrels (each holding 42 gallons) of wastewater in 2011. About 7 million barrels were shipped to Ohio injection wells.
Ohio is projecting that its injection wells handled nearly 14 million barrels in 2012, up from 12.8 million barrels in 2011. (Final figures have not been compiled). More than half of that volume came from Pennsylvania and West Virginia.
While the increases are huge, what happens when Ohio has more wells? Will there be a reliable method for disposal of the flow back water from the Pennsylvania and Ohio wells.
As mentioned in the article, Ohio has no means of banning the shipments from out of state. Ohio tried to regulate shipments of out-of-state solid waste from the east coast. A similar issue arose when eastern states stopped permitting new landfills and Ohio was the closest state with available capacity. Ohio starting receiving shipments of solid waste by rail.
Laws meant to regulate the shipments of out-of-state solid waste were struck down as unconstitutional. Solid waste was determined by the courts to constitute "interstate commerce." Under the U.S. Constitution, one state cannot treat unfairly interstate commerce.
Now a similar dynamic is playing out with flow back water from fracking. The issue will only get worse when Ohio has more wells drilled and needs to find a home for more flowback water generated in-state.
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