Water used for fracking on the rise but remains a small slice of MAWC sales – By Rich Cholodofsky (Triblive) / May 12, 2024
Water sales for fracking activities throughout Westmoreland and its neighboring counties represent only a small portion of what is distributed daily to local residential, commercial and industrial customers, according to recently released data.
Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County said water purchased by local energy companies accounts for just 4% of the more than 11.5 billion gallons that were sold over the preceding 12 months.
“It’s minuscule in the total amount of water we move,” said MAWC business manager Brian Hohman.
The authority, since its creation in the early 1940s, has sold water to residential, business and industrial customers. In recent years, its customer base has become more heavily reliant on residential users and bulk sales to other municipal water systems even as demand from energy companies has increased due to proliferation of new wells that require fracking techniques to extract natural gas from the ground.
