A Texas-based company that specializes in water services to the oil and gas industry is exploring building an injection well on McMullen Drive in Brookfield to dispose of tainted water, Brookfield Trustee Dan Suttles said.
While township officials have no say as to whether an injection well locates in their towns, Suttles is hoping Trumbull County commissioners will go along with denying the company a basic need to keep them from building.
Select Water Solutions is the company looking to build the injection well, Suttles said. An attempt to reach the company for comment on its plans was not successful. The Ohio Department of Natural Resources regulates injection wells in Ohio. ODNR did not respond to a request for information on Select Water’s application, if one has been filed.
Select Water has been performing seismic testing at the site, Suttles said.
Suttles said he is not anti-business, but he is anti-injection well. Injection wells dispose of water that has been used in fracking, a process of mixing water and chemicals to smash shale and free the natural gas contained in the rock. That chemically-tainted water can be reused, but it also can be disposed of by injecting it far underground.
“They want to inject poison underneath where we all live,” Suttles said. “I don’t think this is good for our community.”
He also noted that the property is close to the Brookfield Local School District campus.
The property in question, which is owned by Joseph Hray of Warren, is reachable only by McMullen Street, a county-owned road in poor condition off Route 7, south of Route 82. The company would have to go through county-owned property to get to the potential well property, Suttles said. The company has reached out to Trumbull County Engineer Randy Smith about improving the road, Suttles said.
At the March 6 county commissioners’ meeting, Suttles asked the commissioners “to not allow this company to access their property through Trumbull County-owned property. I don’t know if that will work or not. They might find a way around it.”
Commissioner Mauro Cantalamessa supported considering Suttles’ plan.
“We’re tired of injection wells,” he said. “We’ve become a dumping ground. They’re shown to be detrimental to communities, the biological and the health concerns, especially with the water table right there, people having wells. That’s something we need to collectively fight or find a mechanism to stop, in my opinion.”
This site was once considered for an injection well some years ago, but it was never completed, Suttles said. Two injection wells on Route 7 north of Warren Sharon Road started operation in 2019, but owner Highland Field Service LLC pulled the plug after one of the wells partially caved in 7,000 feet underground, ODNR said. Suttles said Highland has abandoned the site.
