Following the lead of the Deepwater Horizon PR team, Hess Oil company revised the amount of wastewater leaking from oil field in North Dakota from an initial estimate of 8,700 gallons to more than 1.4 million gallons, an environmental disaster that could take more than a year to clean up, according to the Associated Press.
The leak in the six-inch pipe was first reported by Hess on August 15th, but state environmental officials believe the leak began sometime in mid-July. The saltwater leak was first reported by an area farmer whose land the pipeline runs through.
The water, enough to fill two Olympic-sized swimming pools, was not at risk of contaminating drinking water; the nearest well is two miles away. However, the risk to the farmland is significantly greater because the salinity of the saltwater used in fracking is many times higher than seawater and it can make acres of land unusable.
While the pipeline was supposed to have pressure monitoring systems, none were triggered by the leak. Republican North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum said the “spill is a reminder of the need for additional investment in monitoring technology so that we aren’t relying on farmers and ranchers as the first line of defense in leak detection.”