When Randy Loeslie saw chemical tanks sitting near water wells, he saw a threat to thousands of people.

"It's just a problem waiting to happen, the way we see it," said Loeslie, manager of the Grand Forks Traill Water District, which serves about 10,000 people in northeastern North Dakota. "These chemigation tanks were being placed within two, three-hundred feet of our water wells."

North Dakota farmers see the practice of applying pesticides and fertilizers through irrigation systems as being easier and cheaper than other methods.

Leslie worried that leaky tanks might contaminate groundwater, so he approached two state senators, who in turn appealed to the state Agriculture Department. The agency is now considering whether new rules should be required for tanks used in the practice called chemigation.

"It's been a practice used for a long time, but it's something that needs our attention," Agriculture Commissioner Roger Johnson said.

Chemigation rules in most states are stricter than North Dakota's rules, said Jim Gray, the department's lead farm chemical regulator. A North Dakota farmer who wants to set up a chemigation system need only follow design rules and install a device that prevents the backflow of chemicals into the water well supplying the irrigation system.

In most other states, including Minnesota, chemigation systems are required to have containment systems around the tanks to catch any spilled chemical and prevent it from contaminating groundwater.

The Agriculture Department held public meetings earlier this summer in Steele, Oakes and Larimore to take comments on whether more chemigation rules are needed. Gray said officials plan to talk with their counterparts in other states before deciding whether to require containment systems. The department also is considering permits or registration so it can better track chemigation systems in North Dakota.

"Right now the Department of Agriculture has no real good estimate of the number of chemigation (systems) being operated out there, or where they are," Gray said.

Jerry Schaack, a consultant to the North Dakota Irrigation Association, said farmers move chemical tanks around in fields, and their views on containment systems likely would depend on what type of units were required.

"If it was concrete or something like that … it would be very inconvenient and unworkable for farmers," he said. "If they're talking about just putting (a chemical tank) into a (larger) tank that would be portable, maybe that would be more workable."

Thomas Scherer, an agricultural engineer with the North Dakota State University Extension Service, said chemigation tanks typically are filled only for short periods of time, which lessens the risk of leaks.

"You'd be a pretty poor farm operator if you … put 1,500 gallons of nitrogen out there and let it sit there for a year or two," he said.

Neither he nor Gray had any firsthand knowledge of any incident involving a leaking chemigation tank in North Dakota. Loeslie does not want the first documented incident in the state to happen with one of the six chemigation tanks within his water district, which has 15 water wells.

"Just a concrete tank … isn't going to make or break anybody," he said of requiring containment systems.

Herb Grenz of Linton, who rents land to a farmer who sometimes uses chemigation to apply nitrogen fertilizer to potatoes, said a concrete containment system would be an added cost and extra work. It also would be subject to cracking from freeze-thaw cycles, he said, and a portable "tank within a tank" system would be preferable.

"It's got merit," Grenz said of the idea of requiring containment systems. "But let's hope if they're going to do it, they don't have overkill and make it almost not feasible to do it."

Sen. Elroy Lindaas, D-Mayville, said he and Sen. Joel Heitkamp, D-Hankinson, considered legislating changes in chemigation rules but took the matter to the Agriculture Department instead. If nothing is done, legislation is possible in 2009, he said.

Lindaas said chemigation tanks are a threat to contaminate underground aquifers. "Once that's done, the horse is out of the barn," he said. "It would take forever to get those chemicals out."