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Rural PA Residents Fight to Keep Marcellus Waste Away From Swamp

When you drill for nat­ural gas, for every gal­lon of gas pro­duced, some amount of waste­water gets cre­ated as well.

Some­times it can be sim­ple brine that can be dis­posed of in sim­ple ways, such as using it to melt snow on Pennsylvania's roads in win­ter. Or it is used to keep the dust down in summer.

But the waste­water can also be pretty nasty stuff, which can't be cleaned up by water treat­ment plants. One option is to dump it down an old gas well, shoot­ing it deep into the earth. It's a method used in thou­sands of wells across the coun­try. Only five of those cur­rently oper­ate in Pennsylvania.

Read the entire story at our partner StateImpact PA.