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CREATED:20260413T025300Z
DESCRIPTION:Trillion-Gallon Time Bomb: Inside the Oil Industry’s Toxic Wastewater 
 Pollution Crisis\n\nJoin ProPublica for a virtual discussion on how 
 failures to properly regulate oilfield wastewater disposal now threaten 
 public health and the environment. \n\nApr 28 at 1 PM - 2 PM PT/California 
 (4 PM - 5 PM ET)\n\nRSVP: 
 https://events.propublica.org/wastewater-crisis\n\nSPEAKERS PANEL:\n\nMark 
 Olalde\nProPublica reporter\n\nNick Bowlin\nThe Frontier reporter, 
 ProPublica Local Reporting Network\n\nMartha Pskowski\nInside Climate News, 
 Texas reporter\n\nJustin Nobel\nDeSmog, Rolling Stone and freelance 
 reporter\n\n\nThe oil and gas industry’s wastewater problem is a 
 trillion-gallon ticking time bomb beneath our feet. For decades, drillers 
 have injected this toxic waste product of oil and gas production back 
 underground. But increasingly, it doesn’t stay where it should. Instead, 
 it’s spreading for miles, irreversibly contaminating drinking water or 
 blasting back to the surface.\n\nIn the past few months, a series of 
 ProPublica groundbreaking investigations have shed light on the 
 industry’s wastewater crisis. Together, they show that this problem 
 isn’t isolated to a few rural oil fields. It’s threatening land, water 
 and people all over the country.\n\nA cache of government documents dating 
 back nearly a century casts serious doubt on the safety of the oil and gas 
 industry’s most common method for disposing of its annual trillion 
 gallons of toxic wastewater: injecting it deep underground. \n\nThe 
 documents show there may be little scientific merit to industry’s and 
 government’s claims that injection wells are a safe means of disposal — 
 putting drinking water and mineral resources in communities across the 
 country at risk of contamination and jeopardizing local economies and 
 public health. \n\nOil and gas industry wastewater can contain toxic levels 
 of salt, carcinogens, heavy metals and more than enough of the radioactive 
 element radium to be defined by the EPA as radioactive waste.\n\nToday, we 
 are seeing the catastrophic results of lax regulation play out in 
 communities across the country. In Oklahoma, wastewater from local oil and 
 gas operations is spreading uncontrollably belowground, blasting out of old 
 wells and contaminating drinking water. Documents show regulators failed to 
 stop pollution or hold companies accountable.\n\nIn Texas, a small oil 
 company contaminated water that the city of Midland was counting on for its 
 future needs. State regulators did not issue fines, and the company used 
 the bankruptcy process to move on while the public paid the price. The saga 
 continues to this day. The pollution is still being cleaned up more than 
 two decades after its discovery.\n\nIn this session, ProPublica’s Mark 
 Olalde joins fellow investigative reporters from other news organization to 
 break down their findings and illuminate the systemic failures fueling the 
 nation’s oil and gas wastewater crisis. Submit your questions for our 
 panelists below when you register.\n\n 
 https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2026/04/12/18885519.php
SUMMARY:Trillion-Gallon Time Bomb: Inside the Oil Industry’s Toxic Wastewater Pollution Crisis
LOCATION:Online event - join from anywhere
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2026/04/12/18885519.php
DTSTART:20260428T200000Z
DTEND:20260428T210000Z
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