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PennEnvironment has found Marcellus Shale sites near day cares, schools and hospitals.
HARRISBURG — Policymakers in Pennsylvania should immediately strengthen rules that make sensitive ecosystems, areas around water sources and places where people live or work off limits to natural gas drilling, an environmental group said Thursday.
The message comes as drilling in Marcellus Shale natural gas wells intensifies.
Philadelphia-based PennEnvironment said it has found permitted Marcellus Shale sites within two miles of numerous day cares, schools and hospitals in Pennsylvania. It also said there are hundreds of instances of environmental violations flagged by state regulators at Marcellus Shale drilling sites within two miles of schools or day cares.
State law provides for a buffer of 200 feet between a drilling site and buildings and private water wells, as well as a 100-foot buffer around many waterways and wetlands.
Several bills awaiting action in the GOP-controlled Legislature would increase those buffers.
One, introduced by state Rep. Karen Boback, R-Harveys Lake, would increase existing buffers to 1,000 feet. However, a company would be able to get permission to drill within that buffer if, for instance, it secured an owner’s permission or took extra precautions that satisfy state regulators.
A bill introduced by state Sen. Gene Yaw, R-Lycoming, would increase the existing buffer around water wells and buildings to 500 feet. It would leave intact the 100-foot buffer around waterways and wetlands, but allow state regulators to impose a 500-foot buffer around them for the storage of hazardous chemicals or materials.
Last year, House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee Chairman Bud George, D-Clearfield, introduced a bill that would have established a 1,000-foot buffer around buildings and water wells. It also would have established a 2,500-foot buffer around surface-water sources and a 1,000-foot buffer around groundwater sources for a driller that uses hydraulic fracturing or horizontal drilling.
That bill died without action in the Democratic-controlled House. He reintroduced it this year.
For decades, energy companies have drilled shallow oil and gas wells in Pennsylvania. However, in the last three years, fresh environmental concerns have arisen with the influx of energy companies using high volumes of chemical-laced water in a process known as hydraulic fracturing to drill lucrative and deep Marcellus Shale wells. They also use the recent innovation of horizontal drilling underground to increase a well’s production.