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 ‘Alarming’ presence of radioactivity found by Pennsylvania fracking wastewater study

 

Researchers have found high levels of radioactivity, salts, and metals in water and sediment located downstream from a treatment facility which processes fracking wastewater from oil and gas production sites in Pennsylvania’s Marcellus shale formation.
A Duke University team analyzed water and sediment samples from the Josephine Brine Treatment Facility in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, finding radium levels 200 times greater than samples taken upstream from the plant and far higher than what’s allowed under the Clean Water Act.

Radium is a radioactive metal that can cause diseases like leukemia and other ill-health effects if one is exposed to large amounts over time.

The treatment facility processes flowback water - highly saline and radioactive wastewater that resurfaces from underground after being injected into rocks in the fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, process.

Fracking is the extraction of oil and gas by injecting water to break rock formations deep underground. Use of the process has increased rapidly in the US in recent years, yet scientists who have studied the practice warn of climate-damaging methane emissions and radioactive effects that come with it.

The study was published Wednesday in the Environmental Science and Technology journal. It focuses on two years of tests on wastewater flowing through Blacklick Creek from oil and gas production sites in western Pennsylvania’s Marcellus shale formation.

For two years, the Duke team monitored sediment and river water above and below the treatment plant, as well as discharge coming directly from the plant, for various contaminants and levels of radioactivity. In the discharge and downstream water, researchers also found high levels of chloride, sulphate, and bromide, which can interact with chlorine and ozone - used to disinfect river water for drinking -to create a toxic byproduct.

“The treatment removes a substantial portion of the radioactivity, but it does not remove many of the other salts, including bromide,” said study co-author Avner Vengosh, a Duke professor of geochemistry, adding that traditional facilities like Brine aren’t made to remove these contaminants.

Though the Brine treatment facility strips some radium from fracking wastewater, high levels of metal still accumulate in sediment.

"The occurrence of radium is alarming - this is a radioactive constituent that is likely to increase rates of genetic mutation" and can be "a significant radioactive health hazard for humans," said William Schlesinger, a researcher and president of the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, who wasn't involved in the study.

Researchers believe the contaminants come from fracking sites because the Brine facility treats oil and gas wastewater which has the same chemical features as rocks in the Marcellus shale formation.

Some fracking wastewater is shipped by oil and gas companies to treatment plants like Brine to be processed and released into waterways. But most wastewater is reused for more fracking, Lisa Kasianowitz, an information specialist at the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, told ClimateCentral.org.

Kasianowitz said the treatment facility is handling "conventional oil and gas wastewater in accordance with all applicable laws and regulations.”

Vengosh said that the research indicates that similar contamination may be happening around other fracking locations along the Marcellus shale formation in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and New York.

in RT.com

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 Jelly fission? Jellyfish invasion leads to Swedish nuclear reactor shutdown

  weden’s biggest nuclear reactor was forced to cease operations in a queer twist which had nothing to do with earthquakes or anti-nuclear protests. A giant swarm of jellyfish invaded the area, sneaking into pipes and causing a shutdown.

Over the weekend a large number of Aurelia aurita, or moon jellyfish, plugged the cooling water intake pipes at the Oskarshamn nuclear power plant on the Baltic Sea coast, leaving the operator no choice but to disconnect the facility’s 1,400-megawatt Unit 3 from the grid.
The employees of the plant were battling the sea creatures till Tuesday, when a spokesman for the operator announced that the jellyfish had been removed and the reactor was being prepared for restart.

“We hope we’ve solved the problem regarding the jellyfish, but we aren’t sure because they can come back,” Anders Osterberg, a spokesman for Oskarshamns Kraftgrupp AB, told the New York Times.

According to Osterberg, the jellyfish got into the pipes at about 18 meters below the sea surface, where the plant collects cold water to cool its reactor and turbine systems.

There was no risk of a nuclear accident, he stressed, adding that the invaders hadn’t made it past the filter or come anywhere near the reactor.

It was the jellyfish which were at risk, as they could’ve been killed by the pressure from the filtration system, but not from contact with any boiling water.

“There will be no dinner of boiled jellyfish,” spokesman said.

Osterberg recalled a similar incident in 2005 when the Oskarshamn’s unit 1 was shut down.

Oskarshamn nuclear power plant in Oskarshamn, Sweden (Reuters / Mikael Fritzon)

Jellyfish clogs are recurring problem for nuclear power plants around the world, which are often placed next to large bodies of water. In October 2008, the Diablo Canyon 2 reactor in California had to be shut down after jellyfish bottled the circulating water screens and caused a problem with water pressure, according to US Nuclear Regulatory Commission data.
Another invasion by of Aurelia aurita into a cooling canal at the St. Lucie Nuclear Plant in Florida caused a massive fish kill in August 2011, clogging the intake pipes with five tons of dead fish in the canal and triggering an unplanned shutdown.

Jellyfish shutdowns were also reported at nuclear facilities in Scotland, Israel and Japan, the Power magazine notes.

According to National Geographic, the incidents may be one of the consequences of what the marine scientists warn is an ominous surge in the global jellyfish population.

The gelatinous creatures have fewer natural predators due to overfishing, while, unlike other aquatic species, they’re also able to withstand increasing levels of acidity in the oceans. 

in rt.com

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