WASHINGTON (Newsradio 1020 KDKA) - Range Resources has accepted responsibility for negligence at two gas well sites in Washington County.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced Friday that the fracking company has pleaded no contest to negligent oversight of the well sites.
The plea is part of a two-year Grand Jury investigation into “environmental crimes committed by unconventional oil and gas companies across the commonwealth.”
“In Pennsylvania, clean air and pure water is a constitutional right, yet too often frackers from across the country come to our Commonwealth, walk into our communities, and―sometimes without care or consequence―strip us of those basic rights,” said Attorney General Shapiro during a video released Friday. “Backed by big investors and big influence, too many fracking companies act like they’re above the law, and put themselves ahead of the people who work on the job site, as well as the farmer, neighbor, and children impacted by their operations. We’re here to remind these fracking companies that the people of Pennsylvania come first.”
Range is being criminal charged for conduct at the Brownlee and Yeager well sites.
The Grand Jury found that Range “knowingly covered up problems with their wastewater storage pond,” at the Yeager site.
Tears in the pond’s lining were also discovered before the project was completed.
A similar problem at a nearby reserve pit was also reported and an employee warned in an email, “[w]e have flushed the reserve pit with approximately 30,000 gallons of water, but I fear this is nowhere near enough, based on the amount of time that the reserve pit may have been leaking.”
The problems caused the Yeager family spring water to become unsuitable for consumption.
In January of 2108, while waste water being transferred onto the Brownlee site one of the tanks began to leak with about a foot of waste water filling a containment liner that was not secured properly.
The water leaked into a nearby field and into an unnamed tributary to Buffalo Creek.
“The leak contaminated nearly ⅓ acres of a nearby farm and required the removal of approximately 100 trees and 12,000 square feet of soil. Range ordered its contractor to remove the contaminated trees and soil, but only ordered them to replace the remaining ditch when the property owner threatened to report the incident to the media.”
Range will pay a $6,000 to the Solid Waste Abatement Fund, $3,000 to the Clean Water Fund, and a $16,000 charitable contribution to the Washington County Watershed Alliance for the Brownlee site. Range will also pay a fine in the amount of $41,000 to the Solid Waste Abatement Fund, and an $84,000 charitable contribution to the Washington County Watershed Alliance for the Yeager site.
“Today, Range Resources has answered for their actions, and they know what they’ve done as indicated by internal documents and their own plea,” concluded Attorney General Shapiro. “But this is just the beginning. We are in the first stages of a long process to hold the well-connected accountable and meet the promise of our constitution to protect our environment for generations to come. That’s why we’re here today, and why my office will uphold our Commonwealth’s environmental laws until we meet the promise of our Constitution.”
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