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Pittsburgh-based oil and gas company EQT Corporation is facing accusations from Greene County residents in a class-action lawsuit filed this summer. The complaint, filed June 20, alleges the company’s natural gas drilling operations in New Freeport contaminated the community’s groundwater aquifers in June 2022.
Residents are being represented by Washington D.C.-based Russell Law Firm and Waynesburg Pa.-based Hook & Hook. While their legal teams have not responded to requests for comment, the lawsuit details eight counts against EQT including negligence and breaches in duty of care. The suit also seeks compensatory and punitive damages as well as injunctive relief, including future medical monitoring for affected residents.
Residents report their water wells in New Freeport became unusable right around the same time that fluid started erupting from an abandoned gas well along the town’s Main Street, June 19, 2022. A Department of Environmental Protection inspection report from June 23, 2022 indicates it was the result of a “communication incident” between EQT’s Lumber well pad and the abandoned Fox Hill well.
“EQT was notified by the landowner on 6/19/2022 of the communication incident. EQT investigated and determined hydraulic fracturing operations at the Lumber well site communicated to an offset well,” the DEP report reads, then continues: “EQT personnel observed fluid and gas expressing from the offset well. EQT stopped stimulation activities on the Lumber 13H and the fluid and gas observations at the offset well subsided.”
EQT maintains that there is insufficient evidence to support that the company’s Lumber Pad wells had any impact on the abandoned well in New Freeport. In a statement to WESA, an EQT spokesperson wrote “EQT is confident that our operations in Greene County have not impacted area residents or their properties and will vigorously defend against the claims in court.”
“EQT sampled nearby water supplies, performed technical investigations and implemented a robust monitoring plan,” the statement reads. “These efforts enabled EQT to determine that there was no communication between the two wells as EQT safely resumed its operations in the area.”
The U.S. Census Bureau indicates 80 people live in New Freeport as of 2022, but the suit’s proposed class could have at least 100 members. Impacted residents are defined as anyone who lived or owned property within a 10,500 foot radius of any portion of a well bore that originates from EQT’s Lumber well pad or Spleen Splitter well pad between June 19, 2022 and the date of class certification.
A geyser in New Freeport
“Communication” between wells is sometimes called a “frac-out” when pressurized drilling fluid finds a seepage pathway, like an abandoned well, and finds its way to the surface. The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has reported 410 cases of water supplies impacted by oil and gas activities since 2007. According to the state, there are over 350,000 abandoned and unplugged gas wells in Pennsylvania. Since the incident in June, 2022, the abandoned well in New Freeport was adopted by EQT; the company indicated plans to plug it.
Some residents there say they’ve found compounds associated with fracking in their water, including ethane, butane, propane, and surfactants. EQT has reportedly denied responsibility for the town’s water quality on the premise that New Freeport is outside the company’s zone of presumption –– a 2,500 foot range in which they could be implicated in water issues.
In fall 2022, the DEP investigated resident complaints of contaminated water, but the agency did not come to a conclusive finding. The lawsuit quotes letters the DEP mailed to residents that stated, “based on information obtained to date, the Department has determined that further investigation is necessary to determine whether the Water Supply has been affected as a result of oil and gas activities.”
The DEP reached a settlement with EQT in November 2023, allowing the company to continue fracking so long as it monitors its operations and provides a list of chemicals used in its fracking fluid to the DEP. The settlement did not address New Freeport’s water quality or the financial hardship for those coping without clean well water. EQT continues drilling operations there.
According to a statement to WESA from DEP spokesperson Lauren Camarda, EQT must grant access to “unprecedented, real-time microseismic data,” which the DEP will use “to protect all wells and water supplies in the area.” EQT also had to submit a causation report for the initial June 2022 communication incident, which the DEP is currently reviewing.
Camarda wrote that EQT has observed all requirements following the settlement. As for New Freeport’s water, Camarda said the DEP so far “has not found links to gas drilling” in 13 of the 24 complaints submitted to the agency.
As EQT keeps drilling, the DEP will “continue to monitor on-site conditions, submitted data and reports, and respond to any complaints made by the public,” Camarda wrote. “DEP has scrutinized, and continues to scrutinize, EQT’s operations related to the Lumber and Spleen Splitter well pads based on an apparent communication incident in June 2022.”
Water Drives
Lisa DePaoli, with the Center for Coalfield Justice, said her organization wants to see legislation that would hold large companies like EQT accountable.
EQT operates thousands of oil and gas wells in Pennsylvania. Between EQT’s Lumber and Spleen Splitter well pads, the company operates 13 active wells near New Freeport. On July 22, EQT announced the acquisition of Equitrans Midstream, creating, “America's only large-scale, vertically integrated natural gas business.” EQT reported an annual revenue of approximately $7.5 billion in 2022.
“Places like [New Freeport] get left out and forgotten, especially when they're poor and rural,” DePaoli said. “We've been to D.C. talking about it, we've asked the governor, we've done a lot of things to try to get some attention on this issue, but it’s not solved yet.”
DePaoli said some households were provided with a water buffalo tank on their property in September of 2023 after her organization supported residents in a “public pressure campaign.”
In an email to WESA, DePaoli wrote that EQT informed residents in July that they could continue receiving refills for those tanks for another year only if they signed a non-disclosure agreement that would release all claims against EQT. As an alternative to water buffalo refills, the company also offered to install Culligan filtration systems for residents who sign the agreement, she said.
“We also learned from the filtration system provider identified by EQT that the systems cannot filter specific contaminants related to fracking,” DePaoli wrote. “We do not know of any residents who felt safe enough to sign the NDA.”
New Freeport is a very isolated community in Greene County; the nearest grocery store is a 30-minute car ride. DePaoli said today her organization is holding another water drive for residents there. It’s the latest of three water drives the Pennsylvania nonprofit has held for the community. DePaoli reports her organization has raised almost $1,000 since July 25.
“The big picture isn't changing –– that is that the water's contaminated and has been for some time,” DePaoli said. “No one's holding the company accountable, and there's a lot that needs to happen to right the situation and prevent something like this from happening again.”
The water drive is hosted through the Center’s website and will run indefinitely.
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