With reports of CONSOL Energy to begin building six well pads and three impoundment ponds on the lands surrounding Pittsburgh International Airport, residents are starting to seriously question the safety precautions that are being taken by CONSOL and the airport.
In addition to the miles of water and pipelines that will frame one of the Northeast's major hubs, there will also be miles of access roads surrounding PIT. This calls into question what kind of safety measures will be taken to ensure those access roads maintain top security clearances, especially when they are being built. In addition to access roads, county council members have also expressed concern with the response-time and availability of firefighting crews in the advent of industrial fires.
CONSOL says that they are planning for 12 miles of water lines and 13 miles of gas lines, some of which will enter PIT property lines at its southern most point. Although CONSOL is guaranteeing that the well pads will sit at a fair distance from the airport's terminal and less than 1500 feet from any private property line, frackers are notorious for guessing wrong and then drilling "near" the initial proposed site in order to hit it rich.
If the proposal passes, Allegheny County will be in a position to make as much as $500 million. But as it stands, the project is still in the "environmental assessment process," which includes getting the go-ahead from such agencies as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). CONSOL's plan calls for 47 different wells to be dug in a total of 6 well pads. Indeed, some of those wells will include pipelines that travel over two miles to reach shale deposits that lay beneath the airport's runways. While some fear that this may cause dangerous conditions for the airstrips, what frightens most is that CONSOL is also attempting to reserve the rights to drill into the Upper Devonian layer of shale which is shallower than Marcellus depths.
If all goes as planned, impoundments and pipelines will be put into place in the first half of next year, drilling will begin in July, and the wells will begin to produce gas in the latter half of 2015. While the proposed drilling will likely be a giant payday for everyone involved, including Allegheny County, many are speculative and believe that because of the drilling's proximity to one of America's most important airports, it is imperative that the proper precautions be taken and checked over many times over well before any digging begins.
Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, "Airport shale drilling takes patience." 25 August 2013.