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Tough court settlement sets the bar for fracking wastewater in PA

Insurance agency says fracking too risky to cover.

In a hearing, today, lawmakers on Capitol Hill probed the health and environmental impacts of a gas drilling boom fueled by the controversial gas extraction technique known as hydraulic fracturing or fracking. Using this technique, companies blast millions of gallons of chemically treated water into the earth to force natural gas from underground deposits. In…

Bowing to industry pressure, state has bent the rules for wastewater treatment plant

Fresh off his state’s radioactive river scandal, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett has once again landed in hot water (no pun intended) over a line in his proposed budget which hands the energy executive he appointed to head the state’s economic development agency "supreme" decision-making power to fast-track gas drilling permits in the state. The man…

I don’t want to jinx anything, but we’re positively thrilled to see GASLAND—the truth-telling/irreverent film about toxic gas drilling—get an Oscar nod for best documentary. If you haven’t seen it yet, what are you waiting for? It’s readily available on DVD. And there are more and more community screenings being organized every week. Apparently industry’s…

Grants special treatment for unfiltered municipal water supplies

Pennsylvania is awash in new fracking operations, which generate huge amounts of toxic wastewater. When drillers were told that they could not send their waste to sewage treatment plants, the state faced a slew of new applications for industrial wastewater treatment plants. Some of the early proposals would have allowed inadequately treated wastewater from fracking…

This is a legal challenge to a backroom deal that would allow a new wastewater treatment plant to dump 500,000 gallons of water polluted by gas drilling chemicals into the Monongahela River each day.

Groups ask Pennsylvania to take a closer look at fast-tracked wastewater treatment plant