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Tuesday, July 30th, 2013

Internal EPA Report Highlights Disputes Over Fracking and Well Water

Author:     NEELA BANERJEE
Source:     Los Angeles Times
Publication Date:     July 27, 2013, 8:00 p.m.
 Link: Internal EPA Report Highlights Disputes Over Fracking and Well Water
Stephan:   Yet another sign of the corruption of the Obama Administration, and its gutting of regulatory oversight to the benefit of its corporate masters. Corruption is the only manifestation of bipartisanship in our present government. You can see it most clearly in GMOs and industrial agriculture, financial oversight, Big Pharma, and anything having to do with carbon energy. People continue to be beguiled by what Obama says, and don't seem to notice what his administration actually does. In my view, the only thing to be said on his behalf is that he is not quite as bad as the Republican would have been.

WASHINGTON — One year ago, the Environmental Protection Agency finished testing drinking water in Dimock, Pa., after years of complaints by residents who suspected that nearby natural gas production had fouled their wells. The EPA said that for nearly all the 64 homes whose wells it sampled, the water was safe to drink.

Yet as the regulator moved to close its investigation, the staff at the mid-Atlantic EPA office in Philadelphia, which had been sampling the Dimock water, argued for continuing the assessment.

In an internal EPA PowerPoint presentation obtained by the Tribune/Los Angeles Times Washington Bureau, staff members warned their superiors that several wells had been contaminated with methane and substances such as manganese and arsenic, most likely because of local natural gas production.

The presentation, based on data collected over 4 1/2 years at 11 wells around Dimock, concluded that ‘methane and other gases released during drilling (including air from the drilling) apparently cause significant damage to the water quality.’ The presentation also concluded that ‘methane is at significantly higher concentrations in the aquifers after gas drilling and perhaps as a result of fracking [hydraulic fracturing] and other gas well work.’

Critics say the decision in July 2012 by EPA headquarters in […]

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