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Updated: D&L Energy Says It May Appeal Shutdowns
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Crews plan to continue working day and night to clean a portion of a Mahoning River tributary that was contaminated by the deliberate discharge of drilling wastewater and mud from Hardrock Excavating, a company owned by D&L Energy president Ben Lupo.
Hardrock and D&L were effectively put out of business Thursday by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, which revoked all of the companies' permits to operate (READ STORY). D&L and Hardrock are both owned and operated by Lupo.
D&L Energy said it is "reviewing the actions taken by ODNR relative to its companies' operating permits, and intends to respond to, and perhaps appeal, such action at the appropriate time and in the appropriate venue."
In a one paragraph statement, D&L said it cannot discuss the circumstances surrounding the incident of its "potential response until these matters are concluded."
Oil and gas industry advocates and environmental groups both denounced the situation.
The Ohio Oil and Gas Association's Thomas Stewart said Lupo and his companies should be "punished to the fullest extent of the law."
Said Julian Boggs, spokesman for Environment Ohio, "The degree of chutzpah exhibited by Hardrock in this instance is astounding -- but it’s almost what you would expect in a state where we have one enforcement staffer for every 2,000 oil & gas wells. We have a legislature that seems more interested in greasing the wheels for fracking companies than protecting public health and the environment -- that only enables reckless behavior.”
More than 6 million barrels of fracking waste from Pennsylvania and West Virginia were dumped in Ohio in 2011, Boggs continued, citing published reports.
“This oil spill, and the state’s inability to give handle the problem right away, is just further evidence that Ohio dove in head first to the fracking rush without really looking at all,” he said. “Industry and policymakers seem to have no credible plan for what to do with all this waste, and how to keep Pennsylvania’s trash out of our backyard.”
Lupo's entrepreneurial involvement in the oil and gas industry began in 1975, records show, with the incorporation of Ben Lupo's Well Services Inc.
Lupo is listed as the registered representative of numerous companies that share the D&L and Hardrock's address on Salt Springs Road or his ownership. Among them are S.W. Oilfield Supply Ltd., B&B Energy Services LLC and American Royalty LLC, all incorporated in 2000, according to the Ohio Secretary of State's office. Others include United Energy Group, incorporated in 2002, Crawford Pipeline Systems LLC, incorporated in 2003, Black Gold Oilfield Srvices LLC, incorporated in 2005, Vernon Pipeline LLC, incorporated in 2008 and North Star Disposal Services LLC, incorporated last year. North Star is the operating unit that owned the deep injection well believed to have triggered the series of earthquakes that rocked the Mahoning Valley in 2011 -- resulting in the state ordering D&L to stop operations at all of its injection wells within a 10-mile radius of that well.
The state-ordered shutdowns only involve D&L and Hardrock -- companies that need regulatory permits to operate.
On Thursday, Ohio EPA spokesman Chris Abbruzzese reported that the contamination at the dump site is contained and cleanup efforts continue.
"The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources have been on the scene since Friday," Abbruzzese said. "The primary objective when the state got to the site was to contain the discharge. The discharge was contained and we’ve got people out there day and night making sure we get this cleaned up as quickly as possible."
Abbruzzese said that higher temperatures expected over the weekend could pose challenges to the cleanup. "If we do get a thaw, it could complicate our efforts. But, we've got people out there who are very focused to get this cleaned up as fast as we can."
The OEPA spokesman said he could not comment on potential criminal charges, since a criminal investigation is ongoing.
D&L's shutdown should not impact the overall interest among oil and gas producers in the Mahoning Valley, said Eric Planey, vice president of international business attraction for the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber.
"D&L has a lot of competition with other operators of Class 2 wells, and most sound operators or drillers have other options," he said before the D&L shutdown was announced. "The [operators'] first priority is to make sure they have a supplier who operates within the rules and regulations."
Earlier Thursday, U.S. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, called the intentional dumping "outrageous" and said those involved "should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law."
"It's practices like this that do give a bad name to the responsible businesses who are working hard to create jobs and to take advantage of this enormous opportunity we have in Ohio to bring back economic growth and manufacturing through using our natural resources in an environmentally sound way," Portman said. "Other companies are fully compliant with environmental standards and that's what this company should have been doing so something could have been done. The company could have complied with the standards."
The incident also underscores the need for full enforcement, Portman said. Ohio has had regulations in place regarding oil and gas dating to the 1970s that recently have been "updated and refined," he noted. Those regulations are "pretty tough" relative to other states, but they give companies parameters that are needed and appropriate.
"I've been supportive of Ohio having good, strong regulations in place, and I think that can be helpful to our responsible development of these oil, gas and wet gas resources that have the potential to not just create hundreds of thousands of new jobs but bring back manufacturing to areas of our state that need it badly," Portman said.
MORE:
Ohio Shuts Down Lupo's D&L, Hardrock Excavating
D&L's Lupo Owns Company That Dumped Drilling Waste
Copyright 2013 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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