Environmental issues
In January 2011, a subsidiary of the company was fined $34,000 by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection for releasing approximately 25,200 gallons of hydrostatic testing water into the Big Run watershed in August 2010 at a pipeline project in Penn Township, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania.[16][17]
In June 2011, the company was fined $180,000 by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection for a hydraulic oil spill and the failure to maintain a drill pit at a natural gas well in Somerset County.[18][19]
In the first six months of 2010, Chief Oil & Gas was cited for 78 violations by the Pennsylvania DEP, more than any other Marcellus shale driller in the state and with the highest ratio of violations at 3.5 per well.[20]
In June 2010, a well blowout and fire at a Chief-owned site injured seven contractors in Moundsville, West Virginia, and burned for days. No one from the emergency response crews had been given instruction on how to fight a well blowout and the burning site was found abandoned when the responders arrived.[21]
In 2014, the company was fined $13,000 after drilling a well into another well and then attempting to hide the event from regulators.[22]
