[ RadSafe ] 'Hydraulic fracturing' mobilizes uranium inmarcellus shale

Wed Oct 27 10:18:11 CDT 2010

Yes, NORM and TENORM have been found in oil and gas exploration and production for decades.
Uranium is more soluble in its +6 state than the +4 state.  Radium is soluble in chloride waters.  Others can fill in the blanks as I have a lot on my plate today.  
Managing NORM and TENORM is now a cost of doing business, and if frac chemicals add to the mobility of uranium, that should be known and taken into account when monitoring and managing the residuals...

We in the states have been dealing with TENORM for a long time.  NRC does not regulate it since it is not source, special nuclear or byproduct material (TENORM that is above 0.05% by weight IS captured by NRC/Agreement States and can be licensed).  There are some exemptions, but that is the gist.

The drinking water treatment residuals are a big deal.  Little utilities cannot afford to have a rad program/license/RSO, etc., so we work with the water quality folks and the solid waste folks to review individual cases as they come up.  We have a Policy and Guidance for addressing it, that we will likely revise in the next two years.  Some of the residuals are highly concentrated and we are putting them under specific license under our general authority to protect public health and safety.
http://www.cdphe.state.co.us/wq/drinkingwater/pdf/TENORM/FinalPDFMaster.pdf 
Our disposal policy allows for tiered levels of disposal of TENORM in approved solid waste facilities; we have a Subtitle C hazardous waste facility that has a license to accept TENORM up to 400 pCi/g Ra-226.  They are not licensed to accept commercial low level waste, which would be a violation of law; but they can accept TENORM.  At least we think so; the court cases are not quite settled yet.

PVE

Phil Egidi
EPS III
Radiation Management Unit
Radiation Control Program
Hazardous Materials and Waste Management Division
CDPHE

222 S. 6th St. Rm. 232
Grand Junction, CO 81501
(970) 209-2885 (cell)
(970) 248-7162 GJ Office
(970) 248-7198 fax

alternate numbers:
(303) 692-3447 Denver office
(303) 759-5355 (Denver fax)

>>> On 10/27/2010 at 5:19 AM, in message <227449.31161.qm at web120707.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>, Peter Collopy <chaosforthefuture at yahoo.com> wrote:
just to add an empirical observation - I did a survey at a plant designed to treat the well development water for chemicals and some of the accumulated sludges can result in exposure rates of ~ 200 micoR/hr at 18" from the equipment. The Ra-226 is the prinicapl contaminant causing the above background exposure rates

PA has a whole set of regs/guidelines originally designed for waste facilities and the receipt of orphan sources. they are now applying some of these guides to the water treatment facilities-Dave Allard has a presentation somewhere on the PADER web site if you are interested in the subject matter

Pete C

Peter Collopy, CIH, CHP, CSP 
Director, Entropy Control 
Chaos for the Future 
129 Second Street
Troy, NY 12180
518.326.6413

--- On Mon, 10/25/10, ROY HERREN <royherren2005 at yahoo.com> wrote:

From: ROY HERREN <royherren2005 at yahoo.com>
Subject: [ RadSafe ] 'Hydraulic fracturing' mobilizes uranium in marcellus shale
To: radsafe at agni.phys.iit.edu 
Date: Monday, October 25, 2010, 11:50 PM

http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-10-hydraulic-fracturing-mobilizes-uranium-marcellus.html 

'Hydraulic fracturing' mobilizes uranium in marcellus shaleOctober 25th, 2010 

UB Professor Tracy Bank and her colleagues have found that hydraulic fracturing 
or "fracking" of Marcellus shale causes naturally occurring uranium to be 
released, raising additional environmental concerns. Credit: UB/Douglas Levere
Scientific and political disputes over drilling Marcellus shale for natural gas 
have focused primarily on the environmental effects of pumping millions of 
gallons of water and chemicals deep underground to blast through rocks to 
release the natural gas.
But University at Buffalo researchers have now found that that process -- called 

hydraulic fracturing or "fracking"-- also causes uranium that is naturally 
trapped inside Marcellus shale to be released, raising additional environmental 
concerns.
The research will be presented at the annual meeting of the Geological Society 
of America in Denver on Nov. 2.
Marcellus shale is a massive rock formation that stretches from New York through 

Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, and which is often described as the 
nation's largest source of natural gas.
"Marcellus shale naturally traps metals such as uranium and at levels higher 
than usually found naturally, but lower than manmade contamination levels," says 

Tracy Bank, PhD, assistant professor of geology in UB's College of Arts and 
Sciences and lead researcher. "My question was, if they start drilling and 
pumping millions of gallons of water into these underground rocks, will that 
force the uranium into the soluble phase and mobilize it? Will uranium then show 

up in groundwater?"
To find out, Bank and her colleagues at UB scanned the surfaces of Marcellus 
shale samples from Western New York and Pennsylvania. Using sensitive chemical 
instruments, they created a chemical map of the surfaces to determine the 
precise location in the shale of the hydrocarbons, the organic compounds 
containing natural gas.
"We found that the uranium and the hydrocarbons are in the same physical space," 

says Bank. "We found that they are not just physically -- but also chemically -- 

bound.
"That led me to believe that uranium in solution could be more of an issue 
because the process of drilling to extract the hydrocarbons could start 
mobilizing the metals as well, forcing them into the soluble phase and causing 
them to move around."
When Bank and her colleagues reacted samples in the lab with surrogate drilling 
fluids, they found that the uranium was indeed, being solubilized.
In addition, she says, when the millions of gallons of water used in hydraulic 
fracturing come back to the surface, it could contain uranium contaminants, 
potentially polluting streams and other ecosystems and generating hazardous 
waste.
The research required the use of very sophisticated methods of analysis, 
including one called Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry, or 
ToF-SIMS, in the laboratory of Joseph A. Gardella Jr., Larkin Professor of 
Chemistry at UB.
The UB research is the first to map samples using this technique, which 
identified the precise location of the uranium.
"Even though at these levels, uranium is not a radioactive risk, it is still a 
toxic, deadly metal," Bank concludes. "We need a fundamental understanding of 
how uranium exists in shale. The more we understand about how it exists, the 
more we can better predict how it will react to 'fracking.'"
Provided by University at Buffalo
"'Hydraulic fracturing' mobilizes uranium in marcellus shale." October 25th, 
2010. 
http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-10-hydraulic-fracturing-mobilizes-uranium-marcellus.html 

_______________________________________________
You are currently subscribed to the RadSafe mailing list

Before posting a message to RadSafe be sure to have read and understood the RadSafe rules. These can be found at: http://health.phys.iit.edu/radsaferules.html 

For information on how to subscribe or unsubscribe and other settings visit: http://health.phys.iit.edu ( http://health.phys.iit.edu/ )

_______________________________________________
You are currently subscribed to the RadSafe mailing list

Before posting a message to RadSafe be sure to have read and understood the RadSafe rules. These can be found at: http://health.phys.iit.edu/radsaferules.html 

For information on how to subscribe or unsubscribe and other settings visit: http://health.phys.iit.edu ( http://health.phys.iit.edu/ )