Company to Upgrade Treatment and Pay
Penalties after Discharge Violations at Western Pa. Oil and Gas Wastewater
Treatment Facilities
(PHILADELPHIA – May 22, 2013) U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency today announced a Clean Water Act settlement with Fluid
Recovery Services, LLC (FRS), which operates three wastewater treatment plants
in western Pennsylvania. The settlement resolves discharge permit violations
associated with the treatment of wastewater generated from oil and gas
extraction activities.
Under the settlement, FRS must
seek renewal of their Clean Water Act discharge permits from Pennsylvania
Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) and request that PADEP include
the more stringent discharge limits in Pennsylvania’s wastewater treatment
standards. This includes a new standard of 500 milligrams per liter for total
dissolved solids in their renewed permits.
In addition, the company will
pay an $83,000 penalty for violations that occurred at facilities located in
Franklin, Creekside, and Josephine, Pa.
FRS will invest as much as $30
million to upgrade the facilities to comply with the new more stringent
discharge limits. Meeting the more stringent discharge limits will
enable the facilities to be eligible to treat wastewater from unconventional
oil and gas extraction activities, such as hydrofracking.
The agreement prohibits FRS
from discharging wastewater from hydrofracking or other unconventional oil and
gas extraction activities until after the facilities have achieved full
compliance with the more stringent discharge permit limits.
The facilities, which discharge to the
Allegheny River watershed, have not been discharging such wastewater since
September 2011 following the issuance of an order to each facility by EPA and a
request from PADEP in April of 2011 that asked oil and gas producers not to
send their wastewater to treatment facilities that could not meet the more
stringent discharge limits.
The
former operators of the facilities, Hart Resources Technology, Inc. (Hart) and
Pennsylvania Brine Treatment, Inc. (PBT), recently merged to form FRS. As part
of the proposed penalty settlements, Hart and PBT neither admitted nor denied
responsibility for the violations.
The
public has 40 days to comment on the proposed penalty settlements, which can be
found at:
City of Fort WOrth Texas dissallowed waste water treatment of Gas Drilling Post production waste water after a priliminary attempt to clean it to permissible levels of solids and contaminates was found to be unsuccessfu. So Good Luck Pa I do not believe they can do it.
ReplyDelete