State Demands Details on Gas Drillers' Water Use

Charleston Gazette
11 March 2010
By The Associated Press

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection wants details about where oil and gas producers are getting water for wells and how they'll dispose of it.

A new online form requires companies to cite the source they're withdrawing from, and how they plan to treat and dispose of water afterward.

It must be completed by any operator using more than 750,000 gallons to hydraulically fracture a well in any natural gas formation, including the vast Marcellus shale bed.

Scott Mandirola, acting director of the Division of Water and Waste Management, says it also applies to companies fracking for coalbed methane.

The information collected will help create a state Water Management Plan, which is due with the Legislature in 2013.