Gas driller pleads no contest to polluting town's water
Pennsylvania’s most active gas driller has pleaded no contest to criminal environmental charges in a landmark pollution case
MONTROSE, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania’s most active gas driller pleaded no contest Tuesday to criminal charges, capping a landmark environmental case against a company prosecutors say polluted a rural community's drinking water 14 years ago and then tried to evade responsibility.
Residents of the tiny crossroads of Dimock in northeastern Pennsylvania said their aquifer was ruined and Houston-based Coterra Energy failed to make it right. That led to one of the most prominent pollution cases ever to emerge from the U.S. drilling and fracking boom.
Under a plea deal entered in nearby Susquehanna County Court, Coterra agreed to pay $16.29 million to connect the residents’ homes to a clean source of water and pay their water bills for the next 75 years.
Coterra’s corporate predecessor, Cabot Oil & Gas Corp., was charged in June 2020 with 15 criminal counts, most of them felonies, after a grand jury investigation found the company drilled faulty gas wells that leaked flammable methane into residential water supplies in Dimock and surrounding communities.
