State to study effects of frack sand at Wyoming County site

• Marie Cusick
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  Marie Cusick was the Harrisburg reporter for StateImpact Pennsylvania.

The Scranton Times-Tribune reports state environmental regulators are looking at using a site in northeastern Pennsylvania to study how the sand used in hydraulic fracturing affects air quality.
A company called D&I Silica LLC is planning to build a transfer facility for frack sand in Tunkhannock Township, Wyoming County. Sand is an important ingredient in most fracking fluid recipes. It’s mixed with chemicals and water and blasted deep underground where the tiny grains help keep cracks in the shale rock open allowing the natural gas to seep out.
Breathing in silica dust can lead to silicosis, which has long been a hazard for workers in construction and manufacturing. But concerns have shifted in recent years to workers in the oil and gas industry. Local residents are also worried about the risks the transfer facility could pose.
From the Times-Tribune:

Now, after months of pressure by locals, the DEP proposes using air monitors and meteorological equipment to sample the local air before and after the transfer plant begins operations, according to a mid-November letter DEP’s statewide Bureau of Air Quality director Joyce Epps wrote to Tunkhannock Borough Council.
The DEP plans to measure airborne fine particles 2.5 micrometers in diameter — 30 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair. For the first time, they’ll also measure 4-micrometer particles, a size chosen specifically for crystalline silica.

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