TEN MILE CREEK WATERSHED: QUANTIFYING ACCUMULATIVE IMPACTS USING GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS

The Ten Mile Creek watershed in Greene County, Pennsylvania, has a rich history of bituminous coal mining and now is undergoing increasing hydraulic fracturing for the extraction of natural gas from the Marcellus Shale. Being a region impacted by room-and-pillar and longwall mining, the additional effects of natural gas extraction on the landscape is unknown. Developing this project, which characterizes a historical baseline of the Ten Mile Creek watershed’s landscape, will create a clearer understanding of the activity that occurred.

Three data sets were gathered and analyzed in order to reconstruct the surface and subsurface strata of the watershed using a geographic information system. These data include mined coal regions and historical aerial photographs from the 1937-42 eras that were then layered over Pennsylvania’s historical industrial mineral mining data. This effort will allow comprehensive analysis of the contemporary shale gas activities, including a characterization of environmental hazards to local landowners. Fundamentally, depicting underground activity in the region will allow a clearer understanding of potential risks arising from shale gas extraction activities.