Marietta was just voted the “best” historical small town in the United States. That is fantastic to say the least. Marietta being the first settlement and the gateway to the west. That designation will truly help tourism and the bottom-line income for the many small shops in and around Marietta. This we are at risk of losing if we do not have clean water. If we allow one family business to make millions while potentially taking away the income to all the local shops benefiting from tourism. We are the fracking industry’s dumping ground.

I attended the Ohio EPA’s meeting and heard their engineer say that the new class 1 well will only be pumping ” non-hazardous” wastes into the well. Here is a partial list of what falls into that category. Acidic wastewater, chemical wastewater, Caustic wastewater, pesticide waste, metal bearing wastewater, rank sludges and wash out water. These are just a few of the many “non-hazardous” liquids that will be pumped down that proposed well.

This well is approximately 6,000 feet from Marietta being just past the Bramble wood Road. But did you know that there is an existing class two well at the brine gathering tank farm at the intersection of 550 and Rt. 7. Just several hundred feet from our city limits. How did that get snuck in without anybody noticing. With all these other failures of injection wells contaminating producing wells and costing millions of lost incomes from local traditional oil drillers. When will this so called “American Growers #1 CL 2 well also fail ?

In the northwest part of our state there was a proposed wind farm. Due to right wing propaganda the farm was put on a local ballot, and it was voted down and could not be built. Why can’t we the affected voters here vote to close down this dangerous business in Washington County? No, we are being held hostage by a govt. agency that has admitted they have never not approved an injection well.(to be clear several permits were dropped because they may not have been approved).

Additionally, there is a major fault line that runs with the river. Brine water contains chemicals that lubricate cracks in the rock formation to slide and open up to allow the extraction of oil (fracking). The brine still contains these chemicals. Can the millions of gallons of this brine waste get into that fault line? We are already having small earthquakes north of Maritta due to the injection wells there. One scenario (only a guess) about the recent well explosion in Wayne National Forest might have been caused by brine waste forcing the oil up that abandoned well (gravity may not have worked).

Again, I close with this thought – Why is it ever right to put the profits of one very rich family business over the rights of the rest of the population of our county.

Stop this permit and future permits for these polluting injection wells and let us pursue ways to close down the existing wells as well. This crap is being sent here because the wells in other states have been voted down and are illegal there.