McKean County fracking wastewater well fails integrity tests
JBL
CYCLONE, Pa. — Not one, but two, failed mechanical integrity tests have stopped operations once more at Catalyst Energy Inc.’s fracking wastewater injection well in Keating Township.
Concerned residents have for many months contested the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) permit allowing the Pittsburgh company to dispose of more than 30 truckloads per day of flowback water in McKean County — wastewater that environmental agencies acknowledge “may be toxic, hazardous or radioactive.”
Catalyst commenced injections Jan. 22, subject to mechanical integrity and other requirements that the Lot 580-1 well twice failed to meet, halting operations yet again.
A subsequent motion filed Feb. 12 with the Pennsylvania Environmental Hearing Board by Hilltop residents and their attorneys requested the special state court reconsider its Dec. 27 order allowing Catalyst to proceed with injections.
EHB Chief Judge and Chairperson Steven C. Beckman signed an order dated the same day reopening discovery in the contentious matter, and extending deadlines to April 4.
The most recently successful brief includes DEP inspection reports recounting the well’s two mechanical integrity failures as well as expert testimony from Marc Glass of Morgantown, W.Va., supporting the appellants’ arguments, in particular the number of abandoned wells in the Hilltop oilfield as well as the hazardous nature of fracking wastewater.
DEP’s own inspection reports show the well failed to meet or exceed maximum allowable injection pressure (MAIP) of 1,000 psi, which the appellants say indicates the well is leaking — one of the group’s main concerns from the start.
“Thus,” the brief reads, “mechanical integrity for the use of the well as an injection well has not been demonstrated.”
The appellants further argue Catalyst and DEP have no way to know how much fluid escaped or what materials the injected fluid may have contained.
DEP first issued Catalyst the permit Jan. 11, 2024, to convert the Lot 580-1 well just off Route 646 (Ridge Road) from a conventional to an injection disposal well.
Believing Catalyst and DEP did not provide sufficient notice and ignored dozens of abandoned and un- or improperly plugged wells within one-quarter mile of the site, the group was successful in November in prompting the EHB to issue a stay in the matter. The decision halted all work at the site until a full hearing could be held.
However, following that hearing, the EHB on Dec. 27 issued an order stating the appellants had failed to demonstrate irreparable harm to either residents or the environment. It allowed the Pittsburgh company to proceed despite myriad concerns, including potential gas and fluid migration that prior testing indicates was already occurring; air, noise, light and environmental pollution; damage to area roads with increased heavy truck traffic; contamination of residents’ underground sources of drinking water (USDW); and the well’s proximity to both the municipal Pithole Water Association and the upper reaches of both Kinzua Creek and small tributaries to Cole Creek. Potato Creek, into which Cole Creek flows, ultimately leads to the Allegheny River, while Kinzua Creek flows into the Allegheny Reservoir.
In their Feb. 12 motion, the appellants further cite incomplete permitting paperwork, a missing concrete bond log for the well casing from the surface down to 3,300 feet, missing mechanical integrity tests on two nearby monitoring wells, missing safety data sheets (SDS), improper site construction in a protected watershed along exceptional value wetlands and trout waters, and the fact liquid testing parameters must be met but injections can continue even as test results remain unreturned.
They argue “DEP’s issuance of the DEP Permit was unreasonable, contrary to the law, not supported by the facts, an abuse of DEP’s discretion, and a violation of the Environmental Rights Amendment” of the Pennsylvania Constitution.
“The extreme partiality of DEP is nowhere more apparent than in its closing argument when DEP unreasonably claimed that the only injury if the (stay) was granted would be to (Catalyst) given its ‘great investment in the project and the fact that they did everything necessary and more to meet regulatory requirements,’” their motion reads. “In the past, DEP has responded to this type of claim by properly arguing that a permittee’s exposure to potential financial harm is a consequence of its own risky choices.”