Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
10/10/2014
A New York state senator announced late last week plans to introduce a legislative package aimed at banning the disposal of Naturally-Occurring Radioactive Materials (NORM) resulting from the fracking process in the state’s landfills. State Senator Ted O’Brien (D), who serves as the Ranking Member on the state Senate’s Committee on Environmental Conservation, will introduce three bills to stop the import of NORM waste from fracking operations in Pennsylvania and the Marcellus Shale formation. Although also located within the Marcellus Shale formation, New York currently has a moratorium on fracking activities as it conducts a study on the environmental hazards of the process. “Protecting our local environment is vital not only to our public health, but to our economic future,” O’Brien said in a statement. “While the debate over hydrofracking carries on, what’s overlooked is the very real threat fracking waste poses to our water, roads, and soil right now. The initiatives we propose are intended to prevent New York from becoming a dumping ground for other states’ waste and protect our natural resources for the good of all of our families.”
The three bills would ban the importation of NORM waste from out of state. One bill prohibits municipal wastewater treatment facilities from accepting wastewater from fracking operations unless the treatment facility meets new performance requirements set by the Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) to reduce the discharge of pollutants. The second bill would end exemptions granted by DEC that classified fracking waste as a hazardous waste exemption. The final bill would ban the transportation of high-volume fracking waste generated by drilling in Pennsylvania from being transported or shipped into or out of New York State for purposes of treatment, discharge, disposal or storage.
O’Brien partnered with the New York League of Conservation Voters, an environmental activist organization, to craft the legislation. The state senator is currently up for re-election, and the organization gave its endorsement to O’Brien for his efforts. “Hydrofracking is one of the most controversial issues New York faces right now, and the waste products from fracking are very much at the center of the debate,” New York League of Conservation Voters President Marcia Bystryn said in a statement.
In the past decade, increased activity in oil and gas exploration, especially in the Marcellus Shale and Bakkan Shale formations, has increased volumes of NORM waste in states where that type of waste did not regularly occur. This increase has resulted in states shipping the waste out-of-state for disposal in landfills with higher thresholds for volumes and concentrations, drawing the ire of local citizens. Michigan has introduced similar legislation in its state legislature, while Pennsylvania and North Dakota are conducting studies on how much NORM waste can be disposed within local landfills.
