Gas Company: Well Flaring Finished
Industrial park operation will supply city
Morgantown Dominion Post
20 December 2011
Northeast Natural Energy completed the flaring process for two
wells at the Morgantown Industrial Park well site Monday morning,
said company President Mike John.
Flaring, he explained, is the “controlled, safe and temporary
combustion of natural gas from the well. This temporary process is
designed to accommodate the initial flow of water and gas from the
wells in the safest manner possible.”
The two wells were flared for just more than 24 hours, he said,
and will now be connected to Dominion Hope’s system.
The natural gas from the wells will serve the Morgantown market.
Northeast drilled the two wells during the summer and began
fracking during the last week of September. The city of Morgantown
had attempted to prevent the fracking, but a Monongalia County
circuit judge overturned the city’s ban in August. City Council
never reached a consensus on appealing the ban to the state
Supreme Court, and the question became moot when the city missed
its deadline to appeal.
The Morgantown Utility Board has been monitoring the work at the
site, and regularly testing the Monongahela River water below the
site and at its water intake, and has reported no problems. Air
quality tests performed by the Environmental Protection Agency at
Skyview Elementary in October also revealed no problems.