Current through Register Vol. 48, No. 12, March 22, 2024
Water quality monitoring shall be conducted pursuant to the
requirements of this Section and in accordance with the water quality
monitoring work plan submitted pursuant to Section
245.210(a)(20).
Unless specified otherwise, all distances are measured horizontally from the
closest edge of the well site.
a)
Water Quality Monitoring Work Plan
Each applicant for a high volume horizontal hydraulic
fracturing permit shall provide the Department with a water quality
monitoring work plan to ensure accurate and complete sampling and
testing as required under this Section. A water quality monitoring
work plan shall include, at a minimum, the following (Section
1-80(a) of the Act):
1)
information identifying all water sources within the range of testing
under this Section (Section 1-80(a)(1) of the Act);
2)
a sampling plan and
protocol consistent with the requirements of subsections (b), (c) and
(d), including notification to the Department at least 7 calendar days
prior to sample collection (Section 1-80(a)(2) of the Act);
3)
the name and contact information
of an independent third party under the supervision of a professional engineer
or professional geologist that shall be designated to conduct sampling to
establish a baseline as provided for under subsection (b) (Section
1-80(a)(3) of the Act);
4)
the name and contact information of an independent third party under
the supervision of a professional engineer or professional geologist that shall
be designated to conduct sampling to establish compliance with monitoring as
provided within subsection(c) (Section 1-80(a)(4) of
the Act);
5)
the name and
contact information of an independent testing laboratory accredited or
certified by the Agency to perform the required laboratory
method and to conduct the analysis required under subsections
(b) and (c) (Section 1-80(a)(5) of the Act). When no laboratory has
been accredited or certified by the Agency to analyze a particular substance
requested in subsection (d), results will be considered only if they have been
analyzed by a laboratory accredited or certified by another State agency or an
agency of the federal government, if the standards used for the accreditation
or certification of that laboratory are substantially equivalent to the
accreditation standard under Section 4(o) of the Illinois Environmental
Protection Act [415 ILCS 5 ];
6)
proof that the applicant provided each landowner referenced in subsections
(a)(7) through (a)(10) with a notice of water sampling rights under the Act
pursuant to a form prescribed by the Department and prior to the landowner's
execution of any document regarding water sampling.
7)
proof of access and the right to
test within the area for testing prescribed within
subsections(b) and (c) (Section 1-80(a)(6) of the
Act);
8)
copies of any
non-disclosure agreements made with landowners, if applicable (Section
1-80(a)(6) of the Act).
Landowners of private property may condition
access or permission for sampling of private water wells or ponds wholly
within their
property or a portion of any perennial stream or
river that flows through their
property under a non-disclosure
agreement that includes
the following terms and
conditions (Section 1-80(d) of the Act):
A)
the permittee shall provide the
results of the water quality testing to the private
property landowners (Section 1-80(d)(1) of the Act);
B)
the permittee shall retain the
results of all water quality testing conducted
pursuant subsections (b) and (c) until at least 1 year after completion
of all water quality monitoring for review by the Department
upon request (Section 1-80(d)(2) of the Act);
C)
the permittee shall not file with
the Department the results of the water quality testing, except that under
subsection (a)(7)(D) (Section 1-80(d)(3) of the Act);
and
D)
the
permittee shall notify and provide to the Department
and the Agency within 7 calendar days of its receipt of the water
quality data any testing under subsection (c) indicating
concentrations that exceed the standards or criteria
referenced in the definition of "pollution or diminution" under
Section245.110
(Section 1-80(d)(4) of the Act);
9) documentation that the landowner
of the private property declines, expressly and in writing, to provide access
or permission for sampling, if applicable. Under these conditions,
sampling of private water wells or ponds wholly
contained within private property shall not be required (Section
1-80(d) of the Act);
10)
evidence as to the good faith efforts (for example, logs of
oral communications and copies of written communication) that were made
to secure documentation that the landowner of
the private property declines to provide proof of his or her refusal to allow
access for the purposes of conducting sampling in
writing, if applicable. Permits issued under this
Part cannot be denied if the landowner of the private
property declines to provide proof of his or her refusal to allow access in
writing and the permittee provides evidence that good faith efforts were made
to gain access for the purposes of conducting sampling (Section
1-80(d) of the Act); and
11)
identification of practicable contingency measures, including provision
for alternative drinking water supplies, which could be implemented in the
event of pollution or diminution of a water source as provided for in
Section245.610
(Section 1-80(a)(7) of the Act).
b) Baseline Testing
Before conducting high volume horizontal hydraulic
fracturing operations on a well, a permittee shall retain an independent third
party, as identified pursuant to subsection (a)(3).
The permittee, through its independent third party, shall, after giving the
Department 7 calendar days' notice, conduct baseline water quality
sampling of all water sources within 1,500 feet of the well site
(Section 1-80(b) of the Act) pursuant to the laboratory analysis procedures of
subsection (d) and as follows:
1) If
an aquifer to be sampled is inaccessible through groundwater wells
within 1,500 feet of the well site, the
permittee shall conduct groundwater well sampling of
that aquifer at the next closest groundwater well that
the permittee has permission to
access.
2)
Installation of a groundwater monitoring well is not required to
satisfy the sampling requirements of this Section.
3) Baseline testing results shall be
submitted to the Department no later than 3 calendar days before commencing
HVHHF operations, unless there are non-disclosure agreements with the
applicable private property landowners. In the case of non-disclosure
agreements, the permittee shall provide a certification to the Department that
the baseline testing results have been provided to the applicable private
property landowners no later than 3 calendar days before commencing HVHHF
operations.
4)
The
Department shall post the results of the baseline sampling and
analysis conducted under this subsection (b)
on its website within 7
calendar days after receipt.The posted
results shall, at a minimum, include the following:
A) the well name, well site location and
permit number;
B) the sampling site
GPS latitude and longitude location, and ground elevation of the well. The GPS
location shall be recorded as degrees and decimal degrees recorded to 6 decimal
places in the North American Datum 1983 projection and shall be accurate to
within 3 feet. The reported GPS location is required to be an actual GPS field
measurement and not a calculated or conversion measurement;
C)
a detailed description of the
sampling and testing conducted under this subsection (b), including
the results of the sampling and testing;
D)
the chain of custody of the
samples;
E)
quality control of the testing. (Section 1-80(b) of the
Act)
c)
Follow-up Monitoring
After baseline tests are conducted under subsection
(b) and following the completion of HVHHF operations, the
permittee, through its independent third party, shall
perform the following:
1)
Notify the Departmentat least 7 calendar days prior to
taking the samples; and
2)
Sample and test all water sources that were subjected
to sampling under subsection (b) in the same manner following the
procedures under subsection (d) 6 months, 18 months, and 30 months
after the high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing operations have been
completed, unless the water source was sampled under this
subsection (c) or subsection (b)within the
previous month. (Section 1-80(c) of the Act)
d) Laboratory Analysis Procedures
1)
Sampling shall, at a minimum, be
consistent with the water quality monitoring
work
plan as approved by the Department
and allow for a
determination of whether any hydraulic fracturing additive or other
oil or gas well
contaminant has caused pollution or diminution
(Section 1-80(e) of the Act). For each water source required to be sampled and
tested under subsections (b) and (c):
A)
a minimum of 3 separate samples, or as many
as required by the work plan and any conditions placed on the permit,
shall be collected by the independent third party, under the
supervision of a licensed professional engineer or
professional geologist (Section 1-80(b) of the Act) consistent with
the approved water quality monitoring work plan; and
B) each sample collected
shall
be submitted to and
analyzed by an Agency-accredited
or -certified
independent testing laboratory (Section 1-80(b)
of the Act) for the following:
i)
pH (Section 1-80(e)(1) of the Act);
ii)
total dissolved solids, dissolved
methane, dissolved propane, dissolved ethane, alkalinity, and specific
conductance (Section 1-80(e)(2) of the Act);
iii)
chloride, sulfate, arsenic,
barium, calcium, chromium, iron, magnesium, selenium, cadmium, lead, manganese,
mercury, and silver (Section 1-80(e)(3) of the Act);
iv)
BTEX (Section 1-80(e)(4)
of the Act);
v)
gross alpha
and beta particles to determine the presence of any naturally occurring
radioactive materials (Section 1-80(e)(5) of the Act);
2) The independent
third party's laboratory request submitted to the Agency- accredited or
-certified independent testing laboratory shall include:
A) the applicant's name, well name, well
location and permit number;
B) a
detailed description of the sampling methods used to collect the samples, the
date and time of the sampling collections, the location where each sample was
collected and by whom, and the specific testing requested;
C) the chain of custody for the samples up to
the point when the samples are relinquished to the laboratory; and
D) a specific request to the laboratory that
the laboratory's report also include:
i) the
name and address of the laboratory;
ii) the sampling method and testing requested
in subsection (d);
iii) the
analyses being performed;
iv) the
test methods used to perform the analyses;
v) the date and time of the
analyses;
vi) the identification of
any test results performed by a subcontracted laboratory;
vii) the name of any subcontracted laboratory
used and the applicable accreditation that the subcontracted laboratory holds
and maintains for the analyses performed;
viii) the complete chain of custody through
all the analyses in the laboratory and any subcontracted laboratory
used;
ix) the test results with the
units of measurements used, when appropriate;
x) an interpretation of the test results,
including the definitions for any data qualifiers applied to the test
results;
xi) the name, title and
signature of the person authorizing the test results; and
xii) a summary of the laboratory's quality
control results for the analyses performed;
3)
The permittee shall, within 7
calendar days after receipt of results of baseline or follow-up
monitoring tests conducted under this Section, submit the
independent third party's lab request under subsection (d)(2) and the
results to the Department for a water source not subject to a
non-disclosure agreement or, except as provided by subsection
(d)(5), only to the landowner of the water source
pursuant to a non-disclosure agreement under subsection (a)(7)
(Section 1-80(b) and (c) of the Act);
4) For a water source subject to a
non-disclosure agreement, if the independent third party follow-up monitoring
test results indicate that concentrations exceed the standards or criteria
referenced in the definition of "pollution or diminution" in Section 245.110,
the permittee shall submit the independent third party lab requests and the
results of those tests to the Department and the Agency within 7 calendar days
after its receipt of the follow-up monitoring test results. The permittee must
identify which specific standards or criteria are exceeded.
e) Upon receipt of the independent
third party's lab requests and the results of the laboratory analyses for
follow-up monitoring under subsection (c), the Department shall, in
consultation with the Agency as the Department deems appropriate, determine
whether any hydraulic fracturing additive or other oil or gas
well contaminant has caused pollution or diminution for purposes of
Sections245.610
and
245.620
(Section 1-80(e) of the Act).
f) If
the Department makes a determination of pollution or diminution under
subsection (e), the procedures set forth in Section
245.615 shall be
followed.