Radioactive material abandoned in Texas gas well
Date: 03-Jul-02
Country: USA
BNP Petroleum Corp., a privately owned company based in Corpus Christi, Texas, abandoned a logging tool containing radioactive americium and beryllium in February after it failed to recover the tool from the well on Padre Island.
The company told regulatory authorities about the problem and followed rules which required it to cover the tool with 300 feet (90 meters) of concrete, officials at the Texas Department of Health and the Texas Railroad Commission said.
The materials, with a radioactive strength of 16 curies, were abandoned at a depth of over 10,000 feet (3,000 meters), and therefore cannot harm people at the surface, the officials said.
"There is absolutely no radiation from these sources on the surface," said Brad Caskey, manager of incident investigation at the Texas Department of Health's Bureau of Radiation Control.
Caskey said the abandonment of radioactive materials in oil and gas wells was not uncommon, adding that there had been five such cases so far this year in Texas.
The case involving BNP Petroleum was brought to public attention by the Texas branch of the Sierra Club, which has been campaigning against oil and gas drilling on Padre Island.
Sierra Club spokeswoman Erin Rogers said the abandoned materials would remain radioactive for 4,000 years.
"It's not an immediate problem but you just never know what is going to happen in the long term for the amount of time that it remains radioactive," she said.
San Padre Island is an undeveloped barrier island that stretches 110 miles (177 km) south from Corpus Christi Bay and draws some 800,000 visitors a year.
It includes the 80-mile (129 km) long Padre Island National Seashore, which provides nesting grounds for endangered sea turtles and is also home to over 350 species of birds.