PA Lawmaker Proposes Two Year Moratorium on Deep Injection Wells

Susan Phillips

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Susan Phillips tells stories about the consequences of political decisions on people's every day lives. She has worked as a reporter for WHYY since 2004. Susan's coverage of the 2008 Presidential election resulted in a story on the front page of the New York Times. In 2010 she traveled to Haiti to cover the earthquake. That same year she produced an award-winning series on Pennsylvania's natural gas rush called "The Shale Game." She received a 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her work covering natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania. She has also won several Edward R. Murrow awards for her work with StateImpact. In 2013/14 she spent a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow. She has also been a Metcalf Fellow, an MBL Logan Science Journalism Fellow and reported from Marrakech on the 2016 climate talks as an International Reporting Project Fellow. A graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, she earned her Bachelor's degree in International Relations from George Washington University.

April 12, 2012 | 1:00 PM

Susan Phillips / StateImpactPA

The Tamarack Swamp in Warren County where two deep injection well permits have been approved by the EPA.

State Rep. Bud George, a Democrat from Clearfield County, has introduced a bill to halt the construction of any new deep injection wells for two years. These wells are used to dispose of frack waste water and have recently caused earthquakes in Ohio and Arkansas. The U.S. Geological Survey will be releasing a new report that links even more small earthquakes in the Mid-west to deep well injections.
Pennsylvania has only 8 permitted wells, but two are under appeal. And the EPA, which oversees deep injection wells in the state, recently shut one down after a blow-out. House Bill 2350 also proposes to restrict the operation of any new well built after January 1, 2012. One new deep injection well is proposed for Brady Township, Clearfield County. Residents of that community have already expressed opposition to the project. Two wells permitted by the EPA for Warren County have also come under scrutiny from residents and local elected officials.
George’s bill also creates new setbacks from known faults, public water supplies, private wells, floodplains and trout streams. George used Ohio’s new deep injection well law as a model. Ohio has 177 deep injection wells. More than 2 million barrels of Pennsylvania’s frack water ended up in Ohio’s deep injection wells last year. For more about the link between Pennsylvania’s frack water and Ohio’s earthquakes, click here.