Local activists have protests at Trumbull County oil-and-gas-waste disposal sites

Staff report

VIENNA

Members of the environmental group Frackfree Mahoning Valley traveled to several Trumbull County locations Tuesday to call attention to the dangers of waste from hydraulic fracturing and disposal of its wastewater.

At the Sodom Hutchings Road headquarters of Kleese Development Associates, they railed against environmental damage done when oil field wastes escape from holding tanks and flow into wetlands, ponds and streams.

At the state Route 169 Weathersfield Township oilfield disposal site of American Water Management, they protested the danger posed by earthquakes caused by injecting oil field waste deep underground.

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources has stopped injection operations at both sites – in Weathersfield because of small earthquakes in 2014 and in Vienna because of the spill that occurred there in March.

State officials said last week KDA’s spill may have been caused by failure of the company to construct the type of containment pad with a liner that was called for in the plans KDA submitted to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

Geologist and Frackfree Mahoning Valley member Susie Beiersdorfer said that news makes her concerned about the injection wells KDA is still operating along U.S. Route 422 in Warren Township.

“When we get a chance, we’re going to see if the Warren Township site has a liner,” she said.

The demonstrations took place as part of a multistate event called “Freedom from Toxic Fracking Waste and Earthquakes: A National Day of Action.”