Water Quality OK in USEPA Report on Wells in Dimock, Pennsylvania
This post was written by Nicolle Bagnell and Ariel Nieland
In 2010, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), natural gas drilling activities in Dimock, Pennsylvania were believed to be the source of gas migration and water contamination problems allegedly affecting residents' water wells. Since then, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) has been investigating and now reports that about 31 of the water wells tested so far do not have dangerous levels of contamination. Last week, USEPA published the results of additional tests conducted on approximately 20 water wells in Dimock, which showed that the water underlying those homes contained no elevated levels of contamination. These results supported USEPA's similar findings from last month regarding tests from 11 other residential water wells in the area. USEPA began testing water wells in January of 2012 for 61 homes within a 9-square-mile radius of Dimock and will continue to publish results from those tests as they become available.
