Fracking water focus starts at the drilling pad, speaker says

Fracking water focus starts at the drilling pad, speaker says

YOUNGSTOWN

Walter “Buzz” Pishkur, former president of Aqua Ohio and member of the Regional Chamber board of directors, said Wednesday the focus of fracking water regulation starts at the drill site, not underground well laterals.

“The focus has to be at the drilling pad,” he said.

Pishkur, now the director of water utilities for the city of Alrington, Texas, was the keynote speaker at the Regional Chamber’s Youngstown Ohio Utica Natural Gas Series luncheon in Youngstown.

Pishkur has had his position in Arlington for about a year.

He described himself as neither a supporter nor an opponent of the shale drilling industry.

But Pishkur and Jim Parajon, another speaker and Arlington’s director of community development and planning, stressed the importance of working with the industry.

“It’s really important, at least from my perspective, that you work with the companies that are involved in this business” as they institute new technologies and operations, Parajon said.

The speakers said they wanted to get facts out to combat misinformation surrounding the industry.

The YOUNG Series was started three and a half years ago in conjunction with the YOUNG Conference as an effort to highlight aspects of the shale drilling industry.