If Murrysville approves its first unconventional gas well, expect “some push-back” to several of the roughly 25 conditions officials want to impose, Chief Administrator Jim Morrison warned council members.

Among the conditions is one that no water will be transported by truck to the proposed Titan well pad off of Bollinger Road. Officials from Olympus — formerly Huntley & Huntley — have expressed their desire to pipe in water from the Municipal Authority of Westmoreland County but have not yet to secure such an agreement.

The possibility of additional large-truck traffic on municipal roads is a major concern, Councilman Tony Spadaro said.

“If they have to truck water, those sound barriers (which council also addressed in its conditions) won’t matter, because it’ll be trucks making the noise,” Spadaro said.

“I have every belief that they intend to pipe in the water. But they have no agreement at this point,” Morrison said. “I really think the issues with the water are availability, MAWC’s ability to produce the amount they need at the time they need it. That needs to be worked through, and nobody knows for sure yet.”

Morrison and consulting attorney Bill Sittig both said they expect Olympus to oppose conditions requiring air- and water-quality monitoring, specifically the placement of three ground monitoring wells at the site.

“We will definitely get push-back on this one, because (water quality) is the purview of the (state Department of Environmental Protection),” Morrison said. “But, we feel it is essential and have included it as a condition of approval.”

Olympus officials have “laid this out legally that they’re going to dig in on air and water requirements,” Sittig said. “And this has little or nothing to do with the fact that they have a problem with (monitoring), but they need to draw that line so they don’t have any in-roads, which is totally understandable, legally.”

Sittig said he’s gotten no indication that Olympus is concerned about local water quality being affected, “but to have a municipality monitoring it? We’re going to get a lot of push-back.”

If Olympus does not agree to pay for monitoring, “there’s no reason that we shouldn’t be able to monitor Steele’s Run or work with property owners to set up air monitoring,” Morrison said. “It would shift the cost to the municipality, but those are alternatives council may or may not want to pursue.”

Another potentially controversial condition was a recommendation from the Murrysville Environmental Advisory Committee that Olympus consider dedicating areas outside of the well pad as conservation space, to a group like the Westmoreland Conservancy.

Sittig said he wasn’t sure if it should be included as a condition, but that something like an easement or use restriction might work.

Councilman Loren Kase agreed.

“That’s a large piece of property to require someone to do that,” he said. “We can see what they think about it, and I understand the intent of it, but I don’t know if I like requiring a private property owner to do that.”

Council will await a response to the conditions list from Olympus attorneys, “and we’ll discuss it further at the next meeting,” said council President Josh Lorenz.

The Titan well pad is first fracking well proposed since Murrysville finalized its oil and gas ordinance in 2017.

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