Presumably from the use of ‘depleted Uranium’ use to cut through rock (Also used in Fracking) see more at the bottom of this page…..
North Dakota finds new radioactive oil waste dump; company removes material from another site
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — North Dakota confirmed Thursday the discovery of a new radioactive dump of waste from oil drilling, and separately a company hired to clean up waste found in February at another location said it removed double the amount of radioactive material originally estimated to be there.
The Canadian company hired to clean up the largest dump found so far, located at an abandoned gas station in Noonan, also said that it suspects the soil at the site is contaminated and that samples were being analyzed.
The twin disclosures highlight a growing problem from North Dakota’s booming oil development — illegal disposal of oil filter socks, which are tubular nets that strain liquids during the oil production process and contain low amounts of radioactive material. Health officials have said that radioactive filter socks increasingly are being found along roadsides, in abandoned buildings or in commercial trash bins — sometimes those of competing oil companies.
State Environmental Health Chief Dave Glatt said investigators are examining the new site north of Crosby — a town about five miles from the Canadian border — which was discovered late last week by Divide County Emergency Manager Jody Gunlock.
Gunlock said he found 15 garbage cans and about 25 bags full of the oil filter socks.
“So maybe one-fourth of what we found down in Noonan,” Gunlock said, “But you know, it’s still a significant amount and it’s still an environmental problem.”
Glatt said the former landowner is in prison on an unrelated charge and that the new owner is cooperating with officials. They believe the waste was dumped before the land was sold, but has been covered up by snow for months.
Gunlock, who grew up in Divide County and moved back in 2012 after serving in the military for 30 years, said the oil boom has changed his once quiet hometown for better and worse.
The population has increased and businesses are faring better than they have in the past, but roads are getting torn up and these new environmental problems increased drastically this winter, he said.
“Between brine being dumped on the roads, human waste being dumped in farm yards, and now these radioactive socks — oh my gosh, it’s out of control.”
Brine or saltwater is a byproduct of oil production and the sewage is because so-called “man camps” where some oil workers live cannot handle the amount of effluent.
Oil companies are supposed to haul filter socks to approved waste facilities in other states such as Montana, Colorado and Idaho, which allow a higher level of radioactivity in their landfills. State regulators said new rules are being written to track oil field waste, in response to growing environmental concern.
Crosby Mayor Les Bakken said allowing oil companies to dispose of the socks at an in-state facility would help decrease illegal dumping.
“I do think if there was a disposal site closer, it would help.”
Confirmation of the new site came as a Calgary, Alberta-based company, Secure Energy Services, said it removed 45 cubic yards of radioactive waste Wednesday, more than double what was originally estimated, from what had been described in February as the largest dump found so far.
Robert Krumberger, the company’s manager of technical services who led the cleanup, said the lower level of the gas station was “completely full of filter socks.” The company was transporting the waste Thursday to an out-of-state facility for disposal.
Scott Radig, the director of waste manager for the state health department, said there is little danger to the public from the radioactive waste.
“The only concern at those levels would be from ingestion or inhalation,” he said.
Krumberger said it’s possible that some of the soil at the Noonan site has been contaminated.
“So at this time, it is suspected, so we’re waiting for final laboratory analysis to determine what remains in the soil where the filter socks were stored.”
The state has no plans to clean up the private land at Noonan further after the radioactive material was removed, Radig said.
“It’s still a dumpy site,” he said. “It’s not what I would call a clean site.”
Filter socks at saltwater disposals in the oil & gas industry, specifically in the Bakken formation, have been found after to use to contain elevated levels of Ra-226, Ra-228, and Pb-210. These radioactive impacted filter socks are not allowed to be disposed of at subtitle D landfills or at any facility in the State of North Dakota. In fact, the City of Williston, ND is imposing immediate $10,000 fines if filter socks are brought to their landfill. No one is as qualified as Next Generation to characterize, transport, and dispose of filter socks.
North Dakota struggling to deal with radioactive fracking waste
the use of Depleted Uranium in the shaped charge head or “gun” blasting device. (Halliburton)
The metal which was formerly employed for the shaped charge head or “gun” was copper. This creates a pressure of 300,000 atmospheres which pushes the rock aside by plastic deformation. But in 1984 a US patent (US 4441428) was filed by one Thomas Wilson, entitled “Conical Shaped Charge Liner of Depleted Uranium.” The patent begins: “this invention relates to a novel blasting device especially adapted for drilling oil and gas wells.” Wilson records that DU is 5-times as efficient as copper in terms of the length of the jetted hole, creating a pressure of 600,000 atmospheres. Because of the uranium’s greater chemical reactivity it actually creates new chemical compounds with the material in the rock (and the oil and gas).
In case you might think this is all scaremongering, academic and unrelated to fracking, another patent was filed more recently in 2011 (US Patent 20110000669) by Halliburton (think: oil, gas, armaments, missiles, Dick Cheney) entitled “Perforating gun assembly and method for controlling wellbore pressure during perforating”. The patent specifically refers to Depleted Uranium.
*Second is radiation exposure and radioactive contamination of the development areas due to toxic chemicals forced down the bore hole and the release of natural substances below the surface trapped by gravity.
Locked up in the strata into which they pump the pressurized process water, to fracture and thus create the huge surface area sponge which will yield up its cargo of gas and oil, is a monstrous amount of natural uranium and its deadly daughter Radium-226. And vast amounts of the radioactive alpha emitting gas Radon-222, and its own daughters Bismuth 214, Lead-210 and the alpha emitter Polonium-210. Remember Polonium-210? That was the material used when a few millionths of a gram poisoned ex-Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko.
Deep down in the earth, there is a lot of radioactivity, which is safe enough, so long as it is not brought up to the surface. The technical term is NORM (Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material). When it is brought to the surface it becomes Technologically Enhanced, or TENORM, and it is a serious health problem near oil wells and gas production sites. It is in the production water, in the oil, in the gas, around the production sites, the groundwater, in the pipes and tanks – and in your kitchen.
So not only is there a lot of natural radioactive material surfacing in the gas or oil stream, and the production water, there is the possibility also a lot of unnatural radioactivity coming up from the DU shaped charges. And besides the fact that Depleted Uranium is the most efficient of these shaped charge metals, let’s not forget the attraction to the US nuclear industry of a way of getting rid of its vast stocks of Depleted Uranium, or even natural Uranium, or even nuclear waste. I mean, who is going to look at the radioactivity in the process water? It will be radioactive from the Radium and Radon daughters anyway. You would need to carry out some sophisticated analysis to see if it contained any nasty man-made radionuclides, especially DU nanoparticles.
More HERE