Drilling Safety Bill Headed To Corbett’s Desk

Scott Detrow / StateIm­pact Pennsylvania

Tioga County’s emer­gency call center

A bill increas­ing safety stan­dards at nat­ural gas well pads is headed to Gov­er­nor Corbett’s desk for a signature.

As Penn­syl­va­nia Pub­lic Radio’s Mary Wil­son reports, the mea­sure will require energy com­pa­nies to post GPS coor­di­nates at each well site.

“It really is about the basic rules of pub­lic safety with plan­ning, shar­ing those emer­gency plans, and giv­ing 911 the infor­ma­tion at their fin­ger­tips in the event of an emer­gency,” said spon­sor­ing Sen. Lisa Baker, a Repub­li­can of Pike County.

Cory Angell, a spokesman for the state Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency, said many coun­ties are already requir­ing drillers to take sim­i­lar safety pre­cau­tions, but it’s impor­tant to estab­lish statewide standards.

“The drilling’s occur­ring in loca­tions in the state that are very rural. There aren’t street addresses and so it’s very impor­tant to have those GPS coor­di­nates.  That way, our first respon­ders that are local to the area can get there and help save life and limb if necessary.”

As the post points out, this is some­thing many drillers have been doing for awhile.

This is a state law local offi­cials have been push­ing hard for. Many drill pads are sit­u­ated in rural areas with no clear address. And the rig work­ers aren’t usu­ally from the imme­di­ate area, and don’t know what infor­ma­tion to pro­vide to emer­gency respon­ders when they call for help. We’ve cov­ered this in a cou­ple StateIm­pact Penn­syl­va­nia reports: our look at how Pennsylvania’s nat­ural gas boom is stress­ing county 911 call cen­ters, and a story about how emer­gency respon­ders train for drilling-related disasters.