By JOAN McCOY
Leader staff writer
The Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality will hold a public meeting and hearing Oct. 28 at the senior citizen center at Griffithville to accept comments on a draft permit for a new company that intends to take over a defunct business that was permitted in 2007 to store wastewater from drilling for natural gas on land.
The old company left be-hind two storage ponds full of untreated water. The new company, Oilfield Compliance Solutions, LLC, will have to treat the water before it can be applied to the land.
Mo Shafi, the assistant chief of ADEQ’s water division, said he met with the previous owners and requested that the water be treated “for the sake of the citizens.” Instead of treating the water, the company sold to Oilfield Compliance Solutions, Shafi said.
ADEQ will be present for the testing of the water to ensure that it was safe to be applied, he said.
The hearing this month is only about the disposal of that water. Shafi said ADEQ will likely announce this month that Oilfield Compliance Solutions, LLC also has asked for a permit to treat and dispose of drill cuttings and to treat water-based fluids and discharge the water into White Oak Creek.
Andrew Rike, named the responsible person on the ADEQ permit application, said in a letter to the ADEQ written in January that the proposed facility “will allow for the storage and treatment of drilling fluids and surface discharge of treated drilling fluids.
“The facility would accept and store drilling fluids in two existing storage pits, thence treat the fluids, thence the treated wastes would be pumped to White Oak Creek while the brine and solids byproducts would be disposed of off site,” Rike wrote.
The site is located 2.8 miles northeast of Griffithville near the intersection of Stewart Road and Jim Hamilton Road.
The meeting begins at 6 p.m. The senior citizens center is located at 208 Main St., in Griffithville.
ADEQ will consider only oral or written comments in deciding if the permit request will be approved. The public-comment period ends at the close of the meeting.
The draft permit may be reviewed online under the permit search number 4929-WR-3.
The address of the site is http://www.adeq.state.ar.us/home/pdssql/pds.asp.
For more information contact Stephen Hogan at hogan@adeq.state.ar.us.
Send written requests to Department Requests, Stephen Hogan, Permits Branch, Water Division, Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, 5301 Northshore Drive, North Little Rock, Ark. 72118-5317.
