The Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority has been doing testing for bromide levels in the Allegheny River and has provided test results to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection that raise concerns. Four municipal treatment plants that had been taking drilling wastewater are located on the Allegheny River.
DEP apparently is investigating to learn what are the sources of bromide on the Allegheny river, since bromide can come from a variety of waste streams.
The public needs clear information about whether or not any plants are discharging drilling wastewater without treatment for total dissolved solids, the volumes of any discharges, the locations of any discharges, and the companies, if any, that are taking drilling wastewater to plants without TDS treatment capacity for discharge.
I know that the Keystone power plant in Shelocta has dumps its coal scrubber effluent into the Allegheny river just downstream from Kittanning, in Armstrong County (right next to the Logansport Deep Mine).
ReplyDeleteThere is also another coal scrubber plant downriver in Cheswick, which I would assume does the same. Also a lot of AMD along the Allegheny.
-Mike