Drill bits
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has issued an emergency order against Range Resources, accusing the driller of contaminating an aquifer in Texas. Range was the first to drill into Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale.
The EPA Tuesday gave the Fort Worth-based company 48 hours to provide clean drinking water to Texas’ Parker County residents and find a solution to the problem.
While Range denies being the source of the contamination and has cooperated with the investigation, the EPA has found methane and cance-causing benzene in two of the company’s wells.
Reporter Susan Philips, our resident Shale expert, says Range has one of the largest holdings of gas reserves in the state’s Marcellus shale and just broke ground on a new shale headquarters in western Pennsylvania.
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