DEP fines pipeline company $250,000 for violations in Lycoming County

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.

September 24, 2014 | 2:41 PM

Crews weld a pipeline the Loyalsock State Forest.

The Department of Environmental Protection fined NFG Midstream Trout Run for violating the state Clean Streams Law 13 times over a seven-month stretch beginning in October, 2011. The infractions occurred during the construction of a 16-mile length of pipeline running from a Seneca Resources well pad in McIntyre Township to the Transco transmission pipeline in Loyalsock Township. DEP says the company discharged sediment into local streams.
“NFG’s failure to implement and maintain erosion and sediment control best management practices resulted in several sediment discharges into unnamed tributaries to Mill Creek and Lycoming Creek, Lycoming Creek, and an exceptional value wetland,” wrote DEP district director John Ryder in a release.
Although DEP says the waterways were impacted, the department says it didn’t document any effects on aquatic life. The fine seems small compared to DEP’s recent $4 million dollar assessment against Range Resources. But it still tops the highest fine incurred by the oil and gas industry in 2013, which was $198,500 paid by Seneca Resources.