2025-01-07 Mike Reimer, Ph.D. - Laserfiche WebLink

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TESTIMONY: Hawaii County General Plan 2045: Leeward Planning Commission January 16-17, 2025 p. 3 its above ground equipment and chemical mixing ponds, is a major source of pollution and, it is not necessarily the fracturing of rock that causes large-scale introduction of pollutants into the groundwater, but the leaching from the surface chemical holding ponds into the subsurface that pollutes potable water sources. (https-//www.nrdc.org/stories/fracking-101#work). One point I will make is that the impacts of hydraulic fracturing are still being studied. Many of the chemicals injected to force fracture have not been evaluated to know their potential toxicity. They have no EPA guidelines for a level of concern. It is a complex system and pros and cons can be found to argue any individual point. It is not sufficient to say that analyses for contaminants only for which EPA has guidelines have been conducted and none are above the EPA thresholds levels of concern. There are thousands of chemicals that EPA has not studied for their toxicity that end up in potable groundwater supplies. But a rule of thumb can be applied. Those chemicals at any level used in fracking should not be there. There is little doubt that fracking operations do pose risks to human health and not just for oil and gas resource enhancement (https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/news/story/study-links-fracking-drinking-water- pollution-and-infant-heath: see Hill, Elaine L. and Lala Ma, 2022, Drinking water, fracking, and infant health, J. Health Econ., 102595). 1 note that there had been some discussion in the public forum (Bobby Camara, Letter to Editor, West Hawaii Today, December 21 , 2024) about the issue of fracking and contamination of the main island system of freshwater lying above the oceanic salt water in the same aquifer of the island. The letter postulated that there would be no mixing of the two waters (i.e., contamination) because the lower density of the freshwater would always keep it above the denser saline water. The Ghyben-Herzberg groundwater system was referenced. That model is useful only in static conditions, and not the real-world dynamic system where stacked aquifer systems are always forced into a mixing scenario. Tidal forces, differential concentration diffusion, recharge of freshwater, removal of the freshwater through well pumping are some examples of how the system is constantly mixed. (Wentworth, C.K., 1947. Factors in the behavior of groundwater in a Ghyben-Herzberg system. Pac Sci 1(3): 172-184). Fracking can increase the interchange between those two systems. On Hawaii Island, there are occurrences of perched water reservoirs where there is an impermeable layer between that perched freshwater reservoir and lower freshwater/saline water reservoir. An example of one such perched reservoir was found from drilling at Pohakuloa Training Area Training Area (PTA) as the Army was trying to find a local potable water source so they did not have to transport water.