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Fracking’s Forever Problem

The ‘Toxic Cocktail’ Brewing in Pennsylvania’s Waterways

Pennsylvania is still cleaning up decades’ worth of coal mining pollution. Now it must also contend with millions of tons of fracking waste, some of it radioactive.

Story by Kiley Bense, photos by Scott Goldsmith

 Yvonne Sorovacu (right), Hannah Hohman (center) and Jay Beal monitor a creek for signs of contamination from the Westmoreland Sanitary Landfill in Belle Vernon, Pa.
A truck for Noble Environmental, the parent company of Westmoreland Sanitary Landfill in Belle Vernon, Pa., drives down a road on a rainy day. Credit: Scott Goldsmith/Inside Climate News

Twenty Years Into Fracking, Pennsylvania Has Yet to Reckon With Its Radioactive Waste

By Kiley Bense, Peter Aldhous
A view of the Westmoreland Sanitary Landfill in Belle Vernon, visible from a strip mall parking lot. Credit: Scott Goldsmith/Inside Climate News

Tracking Oil and Gas Waste in Pennsylvania Is Still a ‘Logistical Mess’

By Kiley Bense, Peter Aldhous
Trucks with the oil and gas industry drive through the countryside in Springville, Pa. Credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Truckers Say Oil and Gas Companies Are Violating Hazardous Materials Transport Regulations

By Kiley Bense
Members of CEASRA, a local environmental group, demonstrate in front of the Tri-County Landfill in September 2023 in Grove City, Pa. Credit: Courtesy of Jane Cleary

Fearing Radioactive Waste, a Western Pennsylvania Community Fights to Stop a Landfill’s Re-Opening

By Kiley Bense

Pollution From a Pennsylvania Landfill Caused Problems for Decades. Fracking Waste Made It Worse

By Kiley Bense
Government inspectors conducted sampling at the Max Environmental landfill in October 2023 in Yukon, Pa. Credit: Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection

The ‘Horror Story’ of Hazardous Waste in a Small Pennsylvania Town

By Kiley Bense
A close-up photo of the mussel, shell open, is shown in the gloved hand of the biologist with water in the background

Elevated Levels of Radium Found in Western Pennsylvania’s Freshwater Mussels 

By Kiley Bense

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