Dive Brief:
- In October of 2013, the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection released a memo that allowed landfills in the state to accept an unlimited amount of waste from fracking; prior legal limits were capped at 9,999 tons monthly. In July of 2013, the landfill in Wetzel county received more than 25,000 tons of drill waste.
- Before July 1, 2015, an investigation and report is required to be submitted to the Joint Legislative Oversight Commission on Water Resources and the Legislature's Joint Committee on Government Finance. The report will examine leachate collected from sites that accept drill waste and the impact to groundwater.
- House Bill 107 is now awaiting a signature from the governor.
Dive Insight:
On March 29, 2014, state legislators amended H.B. 107, which includes three significant changes related to the disposal of drill cuttings at solid waste sites:
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Facilities cannot refuse to accept solid waste in the quantity up to its tonnage limit while taking cuttings above the permitted limits. So, there is no limit for the volume of waste accepted from Marcellus shale; the limit of 10,000 tons of municipal waste still stands.
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$1 per ton will be required to be paid by the oil and gas companies for the disposal of waste from horizontal well sites.
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Any solid waste plants accepting drill cuttings and waste must install radiation monitors by January 1, 2015.
