Washington – The Environmental Protection Agency’s internal watchdog has canceled her investigation of alleged political influence on the EPA’s study of whether an oil and gas drilling process harms drinking water.
The investigation was requested by Democratic lawmakers after a Denver EPA employee challenged the agency’s finding that “hydraulic fracturing” – a process used widely in Colorado – posed “little or no threat” to water supplies.
The process, in which water and chemicals are injected into the ground to boost oil and gas production, is used on about 90 percent of oil and gas wells in Colorado. Environmentalists have long expressed safety concerns about the process near areas where groundwater is used for drinking.
The EPA made its finding in 2004 after asking state regulators if they had documented problems of fracturing fluids polluting groundwater and deciding they hadn’t. Based on that finding, Congress last year exempted fracturing from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act, as long as companies agreed not to pour diesel fluid into groundwater.
But EPA environmental engineer Weston Wilson formally complained that the EPA’s conclusions were “unsupportable” because they weren’t backed up by solid research.
He noted that all members of the panel formed by the EPA to review its findings on fracturing had industry backgrounds, including one who worked for Halliburton, the company that perfected the process.
Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo., followed up Wilson’s complaint by asking the EPA’s inspector general to investigate whether political influence played a role in the agency’s conclusions.
The EPA started such an investigation but has now dropped it, saying there’s no point in looking at fracturing if the EPA is blocked from regulating it.
The exemption, Inspector General Nikki L. Tinsley said in a letter to Udall, “limits EPA’s ability to implement any recommendations we may have made.”
She also noted that the National Academy of Sciences is studying the effects of coal-bed methane production on groundwater. Fracturing is sometimes used in coal-bed methane production.
Udall on Wednesday criticized the decision to drop the study, saying Congress should know whether it acted on the basis of faulty findings.
“Their reasoning didn’t get to the heart of our question,” said Udall spokesman Lawrence Pacheco. “Exempting hydraulic fracturing lets EPA off the hook, but it doesn’t mean the study was sound.”
William Whitsitt of the Domestic Petroleum Council, who pushed for the exemption, said he was “neutral” on the decision.
“I didn’t think there was anything there to be found,” Whitsitt said.
Wilson said the EPA decision leaves the central questions unanswered.
“I went out on a limb, and the agency let me down,” he said.
He said the EPA has never independently looked into the effects of hydraulic fracturing on groundwater in Colorado. He said the regional staff discussed complaints by Laura Amos of Silt, who believes fracturing fluids contributed to a rare tumor she developed, but EPA officials didn’t investigate.
The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission looked into Amos’ complaint and found that while gas got into her well, fracturing fluids did not.
Staff writer Mike Soraghan can be reached at 202-662-8730 or msoraghan@denverpost.com.
