Public Hearing on New EPA Fracking Rules on September 27th in Pittsburgh

by DUANE NICHOLS on SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

David Lawrence Convention Center

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will hold the first of three public hearings on proposed oil and gas emissions standards, from 9 am to 8 pm on  Tuesday, September 27th at the David Lawrence Convention Center in  downtown Pittsburgh. Hearings will also be held September 28th in Denver and September 29th in Arlington, Texas.

These proposed new rules are meant to control and reduce toxic air pollution from oil and gas wells that are hydraulically fractured, including those in the Marcellus Shale formation in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. The EPA must finalize the new emissions standards by February 28, 2012, under a mandate in a court-ordered consent decree.

The public can comment on the proposed rules — the first changes in oil and gas emissions regulations in decades — which would use existing technologies to reduce pollution from well drilling, leaking pipes, storage tanks and gas compressor stations that contributes to smog and can cause cancer. Those emissions control technologies, including capture of volatile organic compounds and other gases now routinely vented into the atmosphere, are already employed by some companies and required by some states, but not Pennsylvania or West Virginia.

Persons wishing to present hearing testimony, limited to 5 minutes each, should contact Joan C. Rogers, USEPA, Office of Air Quality, Planning and Standards Sector Policies and Programs Division (E143- 03), Research Triangle Park, North Carolina 27711; telephone: 1-919-541-4487; fax number: 1-919-541-3470; email: rogers.joanc@epa.gov (preferred method for registering), no later than 4 p.m., two business days prior to each hearing. The last day to register for the Pittsburgh hearing is Friday, September 23rd, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

An eight (8) page Fact Sheet has been developed by US-EPA as well as a fifteen (15) page Slide Show Presentation to describe the essential components of the proposed new rules.  The Charleston Gazette reported on the new rules at the end of July; and, the Sustained Outrage blog contains a brief description.

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FROM "INSIDE EPA"............

EPA Signals Preferred Approach For Precedent-Setting Methane Gas Rules

Posted: September 19, 2011

EPA is signaling its preferred approach for regulating the nascent "methane farming" industry -- a method of injecting microbials into coalbed methane (CBM) wells to ramp up natural gas production -- through strict Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) permits, pushing Wyoming to adopt the approach in pending first-time state rules for the practice.

The Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (WOGCC) is slated to hold a Sept. 20 hearing where the panel will adopt EPA's preferred approach, which the agency outlined in comments on the state's upcoming groundwater protection rules addressing microbial injection in the state's Powder River Basin. EPA has no rules for the emerging methane farming industry, and Wyoming's could set a precedent by being the first such rules in the United States.

Industry officials, however, are already raising concerns about the potential national precedent that Wyoming could set by adopting EPA's strict approach to regulating the sector. Industry also fears that regulators could use the approach to justify stricter rules for all enhanced oil and gas recovery activities, including carbon injection.

Wyoming floated an earlier draft of its SDWA underground injection control (UIC) permit requirements for methane farming in April. State officials postponed an Aug. 9 hearing on those rules after EPA's Region VIIIsubmitted public comments urging Wyoming to broaden the rules to apply statewide, not only to methane farming in the Powder River Basin.

EPA in July 1 comments submitted on the state's so-called bug rules -- referring to the use of microbial organisms -- raised concern that the proposed regulations for the Powder River Basin contain too much flexibility because they would allow companies wishing to perform methane farming to operate under either Class V or less stringent Class II UIC permit rules. The permitting authority in Wyoming is its Department of Environmental Quality.

Because the Powder River Basin formation contains drinking water wells, the proposed rules would be more protective of groundwater, but EPA is urging the state to apply those same protections to all methane farming activities in Wyoming and is advocating that the practice be regulated under catch-all Class V permits.

Class II rules are EPA's UIC well category that is generally used for enhanced recovery of hydrocarbons, such as carbon injection activities, and under those rules, industry can obtain an aquifer exemption, meaning the water quality does not need to meet stringent standards that the agency sets for underground sources of drinking water.

Class V rules, which typically apply to shallow disposal systems not included in any of the other UIC categories, tend to have more stringent permitting requirements than those for Class II wells because they tend to have stricter monitoring and other requirements. "Class II is an easier permit to get," an environmentalist says. Environmental groups side with EPA that all methane farming activities should be subject to strict permitting requirements.

"[T]he process of microbial enhancement of methane production through the regeneration of depleted coal bed methane seams (methane farming) can only be regulated" as Class V wells, EPA's comments say.

The agency further urges WOGCC to identify one well class for all types of methane farming projects, not just those in the Powder River Basin, recommending that the state consider "the associated permitting implications" for coal beds, which tend to contain a lot of drinking water wells and thus would exclude Class II permitting.

Industry's Concerns

EPA is also asking WOGCC to establish as permitting conditions that operators must monitor groundwater for volatile organic compounds associated with methane farming, including sampling for temperature, conductivity, haloacetic acids, and other potential indicators of contamination. The agency also urges the state to require testing of sediment and groundwater of the formation prior to injection to establish background concentration levels.

EPA's preferred approach is prompting concern from industry about the broad policy implications that it could set not just for methane farming in Wyoming but for other oil and gas recovery operations, including waterflooding or carbon dioxide (CO2) injection. "If these requirements are adopted industry may face a demand to adopt them for all other instances of injection," the Petroleum Association of Wyoming says in July 8 comments.

With those processes, which typically operate under Class II rules, the injection is for the purpose of recovering existing hydrocarbons, whereas methane farming is a process aimed at actually creating additional hydrocarbons, the group argues in its comments on the proposed Wyoming rules. The trade group asks that WOGCC consider adopting a new regulatory term to describe the process other than "enhanced recovery of methane" saying, "This term implies a simple recovery which is not the process to be utilized, such as a CO2 injection."

EPA raises similar concerns in its comments on the proposed rules, saying the term should be "re-evaluated and clarified" and that WOGCC should also add a definition of microbial enhancement.

In July 14 comments, Bruce Williams, of the firm Foresight Consulting, says the testing and monitoring requirements for methane farming would be better addressed through the permit writing process than through the WOGCC rules. "The other concern I have is that if we put all of these requirements into a rule for this injection and enhanced recovery, we will receive pressure to put the same requirements into all forms of injection for improved and enhanced recover," Williams says. "We already know that EPA will not give an aquifer exemption that will allow WOGCC to permit these injection wells as Class II wells. We should not add all these unique bonding and monitoring requirements that may be appropriate for protection of the [Powder River Basin] aquifers to WOGCC rules or guidelines." -- Bridget DiCosmo (bdicosmo@iwpnews.com)
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