Keyser to Seek DEP Permission to Treat Gas Industry Wastewater

The State Journal
16 January 2010
By Pam Kasey

The city's water treatment plant took in 78,000 gallons of wastewater from a Grant County gas company.

KEYSER -- The city of Keyser has become the next in a line of West Virginia municipalities hoping to make a little cash for its wastewater treatment operation by accepting oil and gas wastewater.

The Keyser treatment plant took 78,000 gallons of wastewater Dec. 8 from an undisclosed gas company operating near Mt. Storm in adjacent Grant County.

“We ran 18 tests on the water and sent that same water to a contracted independent laboratory — we didn’t want someone to think that our results would be biased,” explained treatment plant Supervisor Mike Kesecker.

“We ran salinity, every metal, arsenic, all that stuff, because the concern was a lot of people told us it was very high in metals and oil and greases,” Kesecker continued. “All the results came back and said it was OK.”

The salts, he conceded, tested high, although he said he did not have the test results in front of him for reference.

Other Cities’ Attempts

Most oil and gas wastewater is injected underground in West Virginia, according to the state Department of Environmental Protection’s Office of Oil and Gas.

But for West Virginia municipal wastewater treatment plants that have attempted to accept gas industry wastewater, high salinity has been a problem.

Municipal plants are not designed to remove salts but simply pass them through, and two problems arise: The treatment processes may be impaired by high salts or the downstream environment be unable to assimilate the salts that are passed through.

Wheeling began working closely with the DEP on managing a high-salinity stream of gas industry wastewater when the salts began interfering with its settling and ultraviolet disinfection processes in November 2008.

The facility received a modified permit to accept the new waste stream but, in spite of measures aimed at solving the treatment problems, plant officials finally gave it up in September 2009, Wheeling Public Works Director Russell Jebbia said at the time.

The Clarksburg Sanitary Board also gave brine a shot in 2008 and 2009 — in this case because the revenues of $200,000 to $300,000 per year could significantly have reduced the need for a rate increase.

Although the 50,000 gallons per day of brine was diluted sufficiently that it did not interfere with treatment processes, the DEP had become sensitized to problems with salts further down the Monongahela River.

In July 2009, the agency presented an extensive list of requirements for a modified permit for the Clarksburg plant. By October, the sanitary board decided to abandon the practice.

Keyser Persists

In Keyser, Kesecker said that the one-time addition of 78,000 gallons of brine added to the plant’s 50 million–gallon lagoons was diluted enough at least for the plant to handle.

“We’ve run daily tests on our plant as far as making sure that this water that we did take hasn’t affected anything in our plant; none of our numbers are elevated.”

But before the plant could accept any more brine, the state Department of Environmental Protection quickly issued a violation to the plant for accepting the new industrial waste stream without a permit modification.

The city still wants to take the water.

Keyser is expecting soon to require an expensive treatment plant upgrade for compliance with Chesapeake Bay clean-up — a nearby system recently underwent a $30 million upgrade for that — and it has been estimated that the new waste stream could bring more than $50,000 a year.

In the city’s view, according to Kesecker, the gas company currently takes its wastewater to a facility in Johnstown, Pa., and those revenues could better be kept at home.

Mineral County Commission President Wayne Spiggle does not support the city’s acceptance of gas industry brine.

“Not only is there an extraordinary salinity to the fluid, but also there are some chemicals that are there that municipal water treatment plants are not designed to deal with,” Spiggle said. “Just diluting these chemicals and letting them flow into our rivers, in this case the Potomac River, doesn’t seem to be the right thing to do to me.”

In fact, Keyser finds itself in the same position as Clarksburg: like the Monongahela River, the North Branch of the Potomac River, where this plant discharges, was found last fall by the DEP to be high in salts.

With regard to plant upgrades for Chesapeake Bay clean up, Spiggle said he believes that no small community can afford them and that state and federal governments should provide funding.

City to Make its Case

City and county officials were scheduled to travel to Charleston this week for Mineral County Day.

Keyser Mayor William “Sonny” Rhodes hopes that specially requested discussions with Gov. Joe Manchin and with DEP Secretary Randy Huffman will convince them that treating the brine is a good thing for Keyser.

“We’re taking all of our test results; we’ve got folders made up to give to the governor and to the DEP, we’ve already sent in a modification on our permit to allow this dumping,” Rhodes said.