OZARK — The site where an Oklahoma company wants to dump waste gas-well drilling fluids will endanger the environment because it is too close to Lake Dardanelle and other bodies of water, Franklin County residents told state officials.
Some of the 22 people who showed up for an Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality public hearing at the county courthouse Wednesday said they opposed the application by Fugo Services LLC of McAlester, Okla., to dump the fluids at a 58-acre site four miles south of Webb City just off Arkansas 309 in Franklin County.
They pointed to remarks by Jim McClelland of Ozark who said that Smith Creek, which runs through the private property on which Fugo proposes to dump, has flooded in the past. He said in 1986 or 1987 the bridge spanning the creek next to the proposed dump site was under water when he tried to drive across it.
A map the department released showed Fugo's application site is bounded by Moores Creek on the east, with Smith Creek and two tributaries running through the site.
Tom Phillips of Dardanelle with the Arkansas B.A.S.S. Federation Nation said his organization objected to the site becauseit is too close to the Arkansas River, which is Lake Dardanelle in that area. The site is in the 100-year floodplain and is prone to flooding, he said.
He said the department's permitting process failed to properly assess sites for dumping and that whatever is dumped on the Fugo site will end up in Lake Dardanelle.
Fugo's plan said the company would truck in fresh water, water encountered while drilling, water-based fluids and mud and drill cuttings.
Company officials did not return a call for comment by late Wednesday.
Several people also criticized the department for failing to properly regulate companies that dump the fluids. Andy Cheshier of Booneville said companies get away with dumping the fluids on county roads and into creeks. He also said the department needed to do a better job of testing for chemicals in fluids that companies dump onto land.
Others, like Chad Jones of Franklin County, questioned why the department continued to issue permits to companies that spread the drilling fluids when it doesn't enforce its regulations on those already holding permits.
Fugo has applied to store and spread gas-well drilling fluids onto the land. According to the application, it would make ponds lined to prevent fluid being absorbed into the soil. Three to five trucks a day, each hauling as much as 5,000 gallons from drilling sites, would dump their cargo into the ponds.
Once a pond is full, it would be tested to ensure the fluid chemical content is within the department's guidelines. Companies are barred from bringing in such things as oil-based drilling fluids, synthetic fluids and those classified as hazardous waste.
If the fluid in the pond is within regulations, it would be spread onto the land. Officials said the department would test the soil regularly.
The proposed Fugo site is 58 acres but the fluid would be spread onto 40.2 acres, according to department engineer Stephen Hogan.
Hogan said Wednesday's hearing was unusual because it was held while Fugo's application is under technical review. Residents will have another opportunity to comment once a preliminary permit is issued. It could be several months before a preliminary permit is issued in this case, officials said.
Under questioning by members of the public, Hogan said the site is near one that Fugo has used for drilling fluid disposal since 1997. The company's permit expired in 2003 but the department allowed Fugo to continue to use it until it could apply for a renewal of the permit, Water Permits Section Assistant Chief Mo Shafii said.
Roger Gooden of Conway said his inspection of department records has never turned up a document Shafii mentioned that gave Fugo permission to continue dumping. He also said the only inspection of the site by the department that he could find was 19 months after Fugo's permit expired.
He criticized Fugo for violating regulations and the environmental quality department for lacking oversight of Fugo's activities.
Fugo was named in a department report last April as one of several companies that violated rules in disposing of waste welldrilling fluids. Most of the violators in the report worked in the Fayetteville Shale natural gas field. Franklin County is in the Arkoma Basin gas field.
Fugo signed a consent administrative order from the environmental quality department dated Jan. 28 in which it agreed to pay a $9,300 voluntary civil penalty. The order said inspections of the site found in 2006 that the company failed to perform annual soil analyses for 2005 or keep records of the volume and type of material disposed of at the site in 2005.
In May, Fugo decided to close the site and seek to renew its permit but to use the 58-acre site off Arkansas 309.
Arkansas, Pages 14 on 08/28/2009