Bradford County Research Articles

Imaging freshwater and saline aquifers beneath Bradford County, Pennsylvania, USA, using Audio-Magnetotelluric (AMT) data

We investigate the utility of audio-magnetotelluric (AMT) data for detecting high electrical conductivity zones indicative of fresh and saline groundwater lenses at depths of < ∼1000 m at seven survey sites in the southwestern corner of Bradford County, PA. Dimensionality analysis indicates the AMT data can be interpreted using two-dimensional (2-D) models. 2-D electrical resistivity models obtained from inverting the AMT data reveal conductive zones at depths of <30 m at all sites, between depths of 50–150 m at six sites, and between depths of 400–600 m at one site. The models show slightly lower resistivities (∼15–30 Ω m) in the deeper zones compared to the shallower zones (>30 Ω m). Consistent with well log data from two boreholes in the study area and salinity estimates obtained from the imaged resistivities, we interpret the <30 m deep conductive zone as the freshwater aquifer, and the two deeper conductive zones as salty/briny groundwater lenses. Our salinity estimates for the deeper zones vary from 1 to 380 (unitless Practical Salinity Scale), which agrees well with previous estimates of Appalachian brine salinity of 10–343. We attribute the high-salinity groundwater lenses to Appalachian Basin brine migrating upwards from deeper in the basin via bedrock fracture and fault systems. Our findings indicate AMT surveying can be useful for imaging fresh and saline aquifers at shallow depths (< ∼1000 m), at least within the northeastern section of the Appalachian Basin in Pennsylvania.

The Susquehannocks: New Perspectives on Settlement and Cultural Identity

The Susquehannocks: New Perspectives on Settlement and Cultural Identity

Bringing climate politics home: Lived experiences of flooding and housing insecurity in a natural gas boomtown

As the extraction of shale gas and oil transforms localities, these places emerge as important, if understudied, sites of contemporary carbon politics. In this paper, we develop a new approach for examining lived connections between fossil fuel extraction and climate change. We propose the concept of carbon mobilization to describe the multiple stages of fossil fuel extraction and combustion that may be experienced independently (as an economic boom, climate disaster, or air pollution, for example) or simultaneously, in locally distinctive combinations – but until now have been considered separately in most scholarship and public policy. We explore lived experiences of carbon mobilization in Bradford County, Pennsylvania, a community that, in the last decade, has gone through a shale gas boom and bust and has suffered from severe flooding. Interviews with social service providers and county leaders indicated that connections between the fossil fuel industry and climate disaster manifested most saliently around housing security—particularly the loss of housing due to floods and economic insecurity related to boom-bust cycles. Economic changes that gas development brought to the community made flood resilience more challenging for some, and easier for others. Perhaps surprisingly, the natural gas industry was a “double winner,” benefitting from climate disaster by gaining a reputation for helping with flood recovery. We suggest that while global climate discourse may not resonate locally in communities that host fossil fuel extraction, people make locally-salient connections between different stages of carbon mobilization, and these connections have important public policy and social justice implications.

Double Marginalization and the Paths of Natural Gas Gathering Pipelines

Efficient natural gas recovery requires the development of an extensive pipeline network of gathering lines, connecting individual gas wells with processing stations and major transmission lines. Networks of gathering lines are likely to face the economic problem of double marginalization, whereby it is more expensive to run a pipe of a given length through a geographic area that is owned by multiple parties than it would be if the area were owned by a single party, ceteris paribus. Due to the economics of double marginalization, gathering lines may be placed so as to avoid paths with multiple property owners. I formalize this using a simple game theoretic model, and explore this theory empirically in Bradford County, Pennsylvania, a jurisdiction that has recently experienced a dramatic increase in natural gas production due to recent innovations in drilling. In Bradford, I observe the locations of recently drilled gas wells and, importantly, gathering lines for a single cross-section of the county taken in 2012. I combine these data with data on tax parcel boundaries in order to investigate whether the paths taken by gathering lines are influenced by parcel ownership patterns in ways consistent with the economic theory of double marginalization.

Comprehensive groundwater safety assessment under potential shale gas contamination based on integrated analysis of reliability–resilience–vulnerability and gas migration index

This study proposes a new integrated framework to evaluate groundwater safety by characterizing the short-term spatiotemporal variations of methane migration risk attributed to shale gas development. A set of probabilistic- and conditionally probabilistic-based algorithms is used to represent the temporal and spatial distributions of reliability–resilience–vulnerability (RRV) over the study domain. Using RRV calculation and copula functions, the gas migration index (GMI) is calculated to identify the interrelationships among RRV for identifying the synergetic variation of RRV levels. The framework is demonstrated and discussed through the southwest shale of Bradford County, Pennsylvania. Results show that 1) reliability is quite high (>0.7) over the southern parts while the midland remains high risk of contamination; 2) low-level reliability spreads to the northern and southern areas from the central parts and gradually diffuses through most grids sparsely; reliability implies negative correlations with methane concentrations; 3) the spatiotemporal variation of resilience has high concordance with those of reliability except subtle discrepancies; and 4) the spatial distribution of high-level vulnerability has subtler classifications besides similar outlines to that of low-reliability. Moreover, results from the GMI analysis show that 1) the gas migration risk is consistently low in the south and the north in middle blocks and 2) high-level GMI shows an apparent rampant tendency across the blocks and spreads to the whole north ultimately. Therefore, GMI is better at characterizing groundwater contamination risk than using a single metric. The framework will contribute significantly to improve management practices taken by shale gas operators and regulators in protecting groundwater quality.

Analysis and Extent of Santa Fe River Flooding in North Florida Attributed to Rainfall and Wind Damage Associated with Hurricane Irma

The Santa Fe River (SFR) is within the north Florida area of the regional Floridan aquifer system. The extent of recent flood damage in the SFR and tributaries in Bradford County has been attributed to rainfall and wind damage to trees associated with Hurricane Irma, September 2017. Implications of the determined cause of a disaster can include the allocation of disaster relief funds. Bradford County, Florida obtained approximately $2.5 million from the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) for emergency flood abatement assistance and $255,875 from the Suwannee River Water Management District (SRWMD), combined with $13,750 in-kind match provided by the county, based on the attributed cause of that damage to rainfall and winds from Hurricane Irma. On January 2, 2018, Bradford County commissioners also approved grant applications to the SRWMD for $2.2 million for Alligator Creek Flood Mitigation and for $90,250 for Hampton Lake Canal to Santa Fe River Flood Mitigation, requiring in-kind matches from the county of $110,000 and $4750, respectively. Our study analyzed historical precipitation data for the SFR Basin and headwaters from 1895 through 2017 and recorded discharge and gage heights from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) to evaluate that presumed cause of flood damage in that basin and to provide a better understanding of historical relationships between precipitation, gage data and flooding in that basin. Recorded USGS peak gage height and Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) also were used to illustrate the lateral extent and relative depth of flooding associated with an extreme precipitation event in the lower SFR vicinity of O’Leno State Park. Finally, we evaluated the condition of the trees in the SFR Basin as an indicator of long-term anthropogenic groundwater alterations. Those data and analyses did not support the conclusion that Hurricane Irma was the only cause of the magnitude and extent of SFR flooding and tree damage in Bradford County and adjacent counties. Other contributors to stream flow in the SFR basin include heavy mineral mining wastewater discharges that have exceeded the maximum discharge volume of “40 million gallons a day” (MGD) under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit issued by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) to the Chemours Company TT LLC (Chemours, formerly DuPont) for Trail Ridge mining operations. The magnitude of those discharges suggests that those discharges and extensive Trail Ridge mining in Baker, Bradford, Clay, and Duval Counties contributed to the flooding and were a factor in the tree destruction in the SFR Basin.

Environmental Impact of Hydraulic Fracturing (HF) using Spatial Analysis, Bradford County, Pennsylvania

Environmental Impact of Hydraulic Fracturing (HF) using Spatial Analysis, Bradford County, Pennsylvania

The effects of dental wear on impairing mammoth taxonomy: A reappraisal of the Newton mammoth, Bradford County, northeastern Pennsylvania

A mammoth skeleton found at the Newton Site, a kettle lake 15 km southeast of Towanda, Pennsylvania, has been referred to Mammuthus columbi on the basis of its high, narrow skull. However, the specimen's thin enamel (1.3–1.8 mm) and moderately high lamellar frequency (8–8.75 lophs/dm) resemble some specimens of Mammuthus primigenius. Prehistoric range maps show that a Columbian mammoth inhabiting the Towanda area would be a significant outlier from this species' range; however, its location would align well with the range of M. primigenius. To better ascertain the Newton mammoth's identification, we examine herein the effects of dental wear on the morphology of mammoth molars. As mammoth molars wear, the enamel lophs become more broadly spaced and the enamel ridges thicken towards the base of the crown. Thus, an older M. primigenius with extensively worn molars might display thicker enamel and a lower lamellar frequency, and might therefore appear to be a Columbian mammoth on the basis of dental morphology alone. Our results show that the molars of the Newton mammoth are well-worn and are characterized by an enamel thickness and lamellar frequency that aligns better with M. primigenius than with M. columbi. We conclude that one must take into account the effects of dental wear when classifying mammoth species using solely molars.

How long do natural waters “remember” release incidents of Marcellus Shale waters: a first order approximation using reactive transport modeling

Natural gas production from the Marcellus Shale formation has significantly changed energy landscape in recent years. Accidental release, including spills, leakage, and seepage of the Marcellus Shale flow back and produced waters can impose risks on natural water resources. With many competing processes during the reactive transport of chemical species, it is not clear what processes are dominant and govern the impacts of accidental release of Marcellus Shale waters (MSW) into natural waters. Here we carry out numerical experiments to explore this largely unexploited aspect using cations from MSW as tracers with a focus on abiotic interactions between cations released from MSW and natural water systems. Reactive transport models were set up using characteristics of natural water systems (aquifers and rivers) in Bradford County, Pennsylvania. Results show that in clay-rich sandstone aquifers, ion exchange plays a key role in determining the maximum concentration and the time scale of released cations in receiving natural waters. In contrast, mineral dissolution and precipitation play a relatively minor role. The relative time scales of recovery τrr, a dimensionless number defined as the ratio of the time needed to return to background concentrations over the residence time of natural waters, vary between 5 and 10 for Na, Ca, and Mg, and between 10 and 20 for Sr and Ba. In rivers and sand and gravel aquifers with negligible clay, τrr values are close to 1 because cations are flushed out at approximately one residence time. These values can be used as first order estimates of time scales of released MSW in natural water systems. This work emphasizes the importance of clay content and suggests that it is more likely to detect contamination in clay-rich geological formations. This work highlights the use of reactive transport modeling in understanding natural attenuation, guiding monitoring, and predicting impacts of contamination for risk assessment.

The shale gas revolution from the viewpoint of a former industry insider.

This is an interview conducted with an oil and gas worker who was employed in the industry from 1993 to 2012. He requested that his name not be used. From 2008 to 2012, he drilled wells for a major operator in Bradford County, Pennsylvania. Bradford County is the center of the Marcellus shale gas boom in Northeastern Pennsylvania. In 2012, he formed a consulting business to assist clients who need information on the details of gas and oil drilling operations. In this interview, the worker describes the benefits and difficulties of the hard work involved in drilling unconventional gas wells in Pennsylvania. In particular, he outlines the safety procedures that were in place and how they sometimes failed, leading to workplace injuries. He provides a compelling view of the trade-offs between the economic opportunities of working on a rig and the dangers and stresses of working long hours under hazardous conditions.

Assessment of policies to reduce core forest fragmentation from Marcellus shale development in Pennsylvania

Marcellus Shale development is occurring rapidly and relatively unconstrained across Pennsylvania (PA). Through 2013, over 7400 unconventional wells had been drilled in the Commonwealth. Well pads, access roads, and gathering lines fragment forestland resulting in irreversible alterations to the forest ecosystem. Changes in forest quantity, composition, and structural pattern can result in increased predation, brood parasitism, altered light, wind, and noise intensity, and spread of invasive species. These fragmentation effects pose a risk to PA's rich biodiversity. This study projects the structure of future alternative pathways for Marcellus shale development and quantifies the potential ecological impact of future drilling using a core forest region of Bradford County, PA. Modeling presented here suggests that future development could cause the level of fragmentation in the study area to more than double throughout the lifetime of gas development. Specifically, gathering lines are responsible for approximately 94% of the incremental fragmentation in the core forest study region. However, by requiring gathering lines to follow pre-existing road routes in forested regions, shale resources can be exploited to their full potential, while essentially preventing any further fragmentation from occurring across the core forested landscape of Bradford County. In the study region, assuming an estimated ultimate recovery (EUR) of 1–3 billion cubic feet (Bcf) per well, this policy could be implemented for a minimal incremental economic investment of approximately $0.005–$0.02 per Mcf of natural gas produced over the modeled traditional gathering line development.

Popular epidemiology and "fracking": citizens' concerns regarding the economic, environmental, health and social impacts of unconventional natural gas drilling operations.

Pennsylvania sits atop the Marcellus Shale, a reservoir of natural gas that was untapped until the 2004 introduction of unconventional natural gas drilling operations (UNGDO) in the state. Colloquially known as fracking, UNGDO is a controversial process that employs large volumes of water to fracture the shale and capture gas; it has become a multi-billion dollar industry in Pennsylvania. We analyzed letters to the editor of the most widely circulated local newspaper in the most heavily drilled county in Pennsylvania (Bradford County) in order to characterize residents' concerns and their involvement in popular epidemiology--the process by which citizens investigate risks associated with a perceived environmental threat. We reviewed 215 letters to the editor that referenced natural gas operations and were published by The Daily Review between January 1, 2008 and June 8, 2013. We used NVivo 10 to code and analyze letters and identify major themes. Nvivo is qualitative data analysis software (http://www.qsrinternational.com/products_nvivo.aspx) that allows researchers to code and analyze "unstructured" data, including text files of any type (e.g., interview transcripts, news articles, letters, archival materials) as well as photographs and videos. Nvivo can be used to classify, sort, query, comment on, and share data across a research group. Letters demonstrated citizen engagement in beginning and intermediate stages of lay epidemiology, as well as discord and stress regarding four main issues: socio-economic impacts, perceived threats to water, population growth and implications, and changes to the rural landscape. Residents called for stronger scientific evidence and a balance of economic development and health and environmental protections. Citizens' distress regarding UNGDO appeared to be exacerbated by a dearth of information to guide economic growth and health, environmental, and social concerns. This analysis proposes locally informed questions to guide future surveillance and research.

On April 18, the Following People Were Charged with Driving Under the Influence in Bradford County

On April 18, the Following People Were Charged with Driving Under the Influence in Bradford County

The Future of Fracking: New Rules Target Air Emissions for Cleaner Natural Gas Production

Natural gas is lauded as a cleaner-burning fuel than either coal or oil, but getting the fuel out of the ground can be a dirty process, especially given the widespread adoption of the technology known as hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”). Concerns about toxic air emissions from previously unregulated fracking sites led to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announcement on 18 April 2012 of new and updated air pollution regulations for these facilities and certain other elements of oil and natural gas production and transmission.1 Compliance with the new regulations is expected to result in major reductions in emissions of methane and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), particularly from new fracked natural gas wells. The rules were a hot topic nationally, drawing more than 156,000 comments after the proposed version was released in mid-2011. Under the final rules, companies have until January 2015 to fully phase in the control measures needed; by comparison, the initial proposal called for a 60-day phase-in for many major requirements. The EPA says about half of all new wells already use the equipment needed to capture the targeted emissions.2 A hydraulic fracturing natural gas drilling rig on the eastern Colorado plains. In 2009 there were more than 38,000 natural gas wells in the state. Many environmental groups consider the new regulations an improvement over the existing situation, but they tend to be disappointed much more wasn’t done. “This is quite a milestone,” says Jeremy Nichols, Climate and Energy Program director for the advocacy group WildEarth Guardians, one of two groups that filed suit against the EPA in 2009 to force action on the issue. “But is the work done? No, of course not. It’s a floor to build on, providing a minimal level of protection.” The oil and natural gas industry has its own concerns about the new rules but has indicated it can work with them. In a press release issued the day the rules were announced, Howard Feldman, director of regulatory and scientific affairs for the American Petroleum Institute, said, “EPA has made some improvements in the rules that allow our companies to continue reducing emissions while producing the oil and natural gas our country needs.”3

Development, Land Use, and Collective Trauma: The Marcellus Shale Gas Boom in Rural Pennsylvania

AbstractThis article describes a place and people undergoing rapid transition using some of the preliminary findings from two years of ongoing ethnographic field work. Through exploring what ethnographic evidence is revealing concerning the impacts of Marcellus shale gas development in Bradford County, in Northeastern Pennsylvania, I illustrate the ways that rapid social and economic change processes are impacting daily lives and community dynamics in one traditionally agricultural and rural place. I provide a broad overview of the social history and current social dynamics in order to understand the significance of the short‐term changes agricultural landowners and other local residents have witnessed and experienced. I discuss some of the most significant short‐term changes in quality of life as seen by a small group of agricultural landowners, in relation to the cultural significance of place, home, and family, and what this tells us about the sociocultural and psychological impacts of rapid energy development. Finally, I comment on what my ethnographic data show so far with regard to the short‐ and long‐term individual and collective impacts being experienced in this one community.

Optimal Well Design for Enhanced Stimulation Fluids Recovery and Flowback Treatment in the Marcellus Shale Gas Development using Integrated Technologies

A typical well was designed with formation properties in Springfield Township, Bradford County, Pennsylvania using computer modeling group (CMG) software to analyze the production potential in the area over 40 years. Multilateral wells gave the highest initial gas production rate and cumulative production of 1.18E+07 ft3/day and 2.6E+10 ft3 respectively. FracPro® software was used for the fracture design. The simulation demonstrates that hydraulic fracturing can appreciably increase cumulative production and production rate in the well, with an estimated 3.6 Million gallons (of water) per well required to fracture open the formation for the free flow of gas. Due to the efficient well design and stimulation design, a load recovery of approximately 86% of the injected fluid is achievable which amount to 73,714 bbls of waste water to be treated per stimulation job. The system capacity of the forward osmosis integrated process, operating on hydraulic fracturing flow-back water will treat 604,800 gallons per day (gal/d). The novel design takes into consideration the flow-back recovery per hour in the system, which is 600 bbl/ hr for the centralized system, but 150 bbl/hr for a single well pad. The tank size required would be a 25,000 gallon tank, covering approximately 1,202 square feet and cost $52,255. The forward osmosis (FO) system uses a thin-film composite (TFC) membrane system based on efficiency and power generation capabilities. The capital cost of each system is about $100,000. The annual operating cost of the FO system would be about $ 0.60/kgal of produced water. A cost estimate savings of over one million dollars ($1,000,000) is expected if the integrated forward osmosis system is implemented. Aside cost savings, the emission generated from the system is minimal, which makes it considerably environmentally friendly compared to other types of treatments.

Sparklebunnies are go!

“Let's help those who want to help themselves,” advocates David Clapham, Senior Environmental Health Officer at Bradford County Council and intrepid explorer

Polyethylene Mulching for Early Vegetable Production in North Florida

Polyethylene mulch has been used commercially on vegetables since the early 1960s. Currently, polyethylene mulch is used on thousands of acres of vegetables in the United States. Florida leads in use with about 100,000 acres of mulched vegetables. In Florida, the vast majority of mulch is used in southern Florida on tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, strawberries, and melons. In northern Florida, very little mulching was practiced until the late 1980s, except for tomatoes in the Quincy area and strawberries in Bradford County. Mulching practices have since steadily increased throughout the rest of North Florida on a wide range of vegetable crops, including watermelon, cantaloupe (muskmelon), tomato, cucumber, pepper, and eggplant. This document was first published in Oct. 1988.

Prevalence of Tuberculosis Infection in a Rural Substance Abuse Clinic and Correctional Facility

In Bradford County (population 69,000), in northern Pennsylvania, we tested 26 subjects at a correctional facility and 35 subjects at a substance abuse clinic to determine the prevalence of tuberculosis (TB) infection in a rural high-risk setting and to see how it differed from prevalence in an urban high risk setting. In addition to PPD testing, data were collected on each subject’s race, gender, and risk factors for tuberculosis disease. Of the subjects who returned for a recheck at the correctional facility, 8.0% of them tested positive for infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis. None of the subjects from the substance abuse clinic tested positive. These prevalence rates were considerably lower than those found in urban studies performed in similar high-risk settings; however, significant differences in racial stratification and HIV prevalence were also observed between the two populations, thus possibly affecting rates of TB infection.1-5

Nationwide Teen-Age Pregnancy Compared to That of Bradford County in Rural Pennsylvania

Nationwide Teen-Age Pregnancy Compared to That of Bradford County in Rural Pennsylvania