State environmental regulators are investigating high levels of methane in a Dimock Twp. water well in an area of the community still off-limits to some natural gas drilling operations because of a past methane incident.
The Department of Environmental Protection began the investigation last week after it received a complaint of turbid water in a private well and later found "high levels" of methane dissolved in the water and airborne gas accumulating in the well, spokeswoman Colleen Connolly said.
Tests at four other water wells did not show elevated levels of the gas, she said, but the state plans to continue monitoring.
The home is near the Costello and Gesford well sites operated by Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. that the state is evaluating as part of its investigation, she said. It is also in a 9-square-mile area where the DEP has barred Cabot from drilling new wells until methane the state first linked to the company's operations in 2009 subsides in 18 water supplies.
The water well now being investigated was not part of the earlier incident, Ms. Connolly said.
As rural deposits of fossil fuel grow fewer and farther between, extractive industries are increasingly siting...
Today, Laura Legere of the Times Tribune has published the first in an important two-part series...
Conservative states, business groups, fossil fuel companies, and politicians who deny the science of climate change...
