Beware- Beyond Here There Be Rants This morning I read an article from the Tioga Tribune about the North Dakota Industrial Commission, Department of Mineral Resources, Oil and Gas Division settling a case of improperly disposed filter socks (used to filter waste from oil drilling) for about $21,000- reduced from the original $801,000 that the company was fined earlier this year. For those not familiar with the issue, they are not cute little socks with lace and frills, covered with a little mud. These are large filters that end up filled with oil waste and radioactive materials. Because of the radiation they can only be disposed at waste sites that can handle radioactive waste. The nearest site is in Montana. Companies have been finding clever ways around this law for some time- in some cases these companies will throw filter socks into random residential garbage cans, in other cases they will hide them among landfill worthy garbage. In the case above, they were thrown into an abandoned building and hidden under snow drifts. Seriously. in all, about 60 cubic yards of waste filter socks were cleaned up with about $12,000 of state money. The county began the investigation and it ended up with the ND Health Dept and the Department of Mineral Resources, Oil and Gas Division (OGD). Heres the thing- in North Dakota nearly anything that happens that involves industry at any great level comes before the Industrial Commission, a group made up of the Governor, The Ag Commissioner, and the Attorney General. All three members are elected officials (two of whom won reelection this year). In the end, the very people that are directly responsible for regulation of the energy industry in this state are elected officials who earn a lot of their election funding from the energy industry. Local officials were not informed of any elements of the deal and apparently were not consulted as the deal was being made. At one point in the article Lynn Helms, director of OGD, argues that settling for less than $.03 on the dollar was a good deal for the state, since we gained info on others that may be violating the law and if the state simply fined Zenith $800,000, they’d have been stuck with a bankrupt company unable to pay any fines, two Burke County saltwater wells not worth their present value and no movement on the case to find the real dumpers.Helms also defended reducing or negotiating fines in other dumping cases on similar grounds. He said OGD now pushes for the maximum penalties in such cases and will negotiate them down to gain the cooperation of people who can help bring the cases to a conclusion. (John D. Taylor, Filter sock fine negotiated down from $800,000 to $20,795. November 25, 2014, Tioga Tribune. journaltrib/?id=67&nid=2528 ) I have no problem reducing the fine because of cooperation from the company. But three cents on the dollar? A person pays a higher percentage at an Everything Must Go sale. This is not the first time that this has happened. There is precedent of this very thing happening in the past. There is also a continual habit of not informing the public of problems with spills and drilling issues. Finally, keep in mind that this was reported by the Tioga Tribune (a fine local paper). Forum Communications, owners of newspapers that have weekly readership of over one million people (including, the Grand Forks Herald, Fargo Forum, Worthington Daily Globe, The Dickenson Press, The Duluth News Tribune, and owners of WDAZ in Grand Forks and WDAY in Fargo), has said nothing about this. I did a search for Filter Sock on the Herald site and came up with no articles in at least 30 days. I dont remember reading about it in the hard copy. I am not one who supports the notion of heads on spikes, but maybe standing strong to the fines issued and seeing a company or two go bankrupt because they have been fined and done wrong may send a message to the rest of the industry. Thus endeth the rant...
Posted on: Wed, 26 Nov 2014 19:26:43 +0000
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