The Sky Is Falling, The Sky Is Falling -- EDF -- December 10, 2017: Natural Gas Flaring In The Permian And The Bakken

There must be a cottage industry made up of reporters who love to take on the fracking industry ... perhaps a story for another time but unlikely.

Now it appears it is the Permian's turn to get the bad press. The Permian, not long ago a dying oil field, is now the largest on-shore shale producer in the universe. And it's going through a boom just like the North Dakota Bakken boom back in 2012 -- when time was more important than money, and infrastructure couldn't keep up with all the wells coming on line.

And, that takes us to flaring.

Folks around the world were captivated with this image, "acquired" November 12, 2012. At the time it was said to show all the flaring in the Bakken. There must have been a lot flaring in Minot and Bismarck when this image was "acquired."

It turns out that image was part of much large image "acquired" at the same time. See how fast you can find the Bakken in the image below.

And it turns out, the vast majority of that "light" from northwestern North Dakota was not due to flaring (if it was, there was a lot of flaring in Bismarck, also).

From a March 3, 2013, posting:

Remember all those satellite shots of northwest North Dakota suggesting that flaring was the reason for all the "hot spots"? So, another look.

From the NASA Earth Observatory website, comes this interesting bit of trivia:

On November 12, 2012, the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the Suomi NPP satellite captured this nighttime view of widespread drilling throughout the area. Most of the bright specks are lights associated with drilling equipment and temporary housing near drilling sites, though a few are evidence of gas flaring. Some of the brighter areas correspond to towns and cities including Williston, Minot, and Dickinson. 

I assume it would be too much to ask to have this checked out at Snopes.com. 

I posted all that so that we would have some background for the November 14, 2017, Environmental Defense Fund, post: "a new Texas Permian oil and gas flaring report reveals excessive gas waste and major gaps in operator flaring practices."

The EDF post even has similar satellite images of all that flaring in west Texas -- but they needed a magnifying glass so folks could actually see what they were trying to show.

During the early Bakken boom I believe flaring resulted in upwards of nearly 40% of produced natural gas being flared. And over the next couple of years, "we" solved that. Now, the Bakken is down to 10 - 15% of produced natural gas being flared. It sort of comes with the territory during a shale oil boom.

So, how's the Permian doing, that's got the EDF (not to be confused with the IDF) all hot and bothered?

The Bakken was producing well less than 1 million bopd when they had that terrible flaring problem -- more of a PR problem than an environmental problem: flaring upwards of 40% of produced natural gas.

In comparison, the Permian:

• oil production exceeds 2.5 million bopd
• of the top 15 oil and gas producers working in the Permian, none exceed 10% (percentage of produced gas that is flared)
• the 2015 average is 4% 
• the 2014 average is 3%

Comments:

• the graph the EDF posts is an incredibly poor graph; the graph does not show how much oil each company is producing
• the companies at the left of the graph are by far the largest operators and they are drilling faster than the infrastructure can handle; the operators at the right are some of the smallest operators in the US; are they even drilling that much or is the flaring due to very, very old wells?
• the EDF fails to note that, compared to the Bakken, the Permian is much gassier -- the ratio of natural gas produced is much higher than the percentage of natural gas (compared to oil) that is produced in the Bakken; by that measure Permian operators are doing an incredible job keeping up with produced natural gas
• North Dakota long term goal is to maintain flaring below 10%; the Bakken is not there yet and will likely get worse before it gets better (for a number of reasons)
• the EDF conveniently forgets that the boom is not over in the Permian, unlike the Bakken which is now in a "manufacturing" phase, not a boom phase of E&P; one would expect that flaring would increase, all things being equal in the Permian during during the "boom" phase
• The operators in the Permian will sort this out once infrastructure catches up to the drilling activity

For me, I was blown away by the fact that not one producer was flaring more than 9% (according to the graph), and that the average across the Permian was around 4%. Compare those figures to those of North Dakota's oily (non-gassy) Bakken below.

Perhaps the EDF could provide a detailed study on the number of birds that are killed each day by dicers and slicers (wind farms) and Kentucky fryers (solar farms).

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Natural Gas Flaring In North Dakota -- An Update

From The Bismarck Tribune:

A significant expansion announced last week for a new McKenzie County natural gas processing plant aims to reduce gas flaring in the region.

Crestwood Equity Partners proposes to expand the Arrow Bear Den gas processing plant near Watford City, adding another 120 million cubic feet per day of processing capacity.

That’s in addition to phase one of the plant, which just came online last week and added 30 million cubic feet per day of processing capacity.

Ron Ness, president of the North Dakota Petroleum Council, said he suspects more companies will make similar announcements to keep up with the expected growth in natural gas production.

The state produces 1.9 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas, a figure the North Dakota Pipeline Authority projects will exceed 3 billion cubic feet per day by 2030.

Also from The Bismarck Tribune: 

Thirteen oil companies failed to meet North Dakota’s natural gas flaring goals in September, but just one is facing restrictions under state policies.

The North Dakota Industrial Commission adopted gas capture targets in 2014 aimed at reducing natural gas flaring across the state. The policy allows regulators to limit a company’s oil production for failing to meet the target, which is currently set at capturing 85 percent.

However, the policy also includes many exceptions, making it rare for regulators to impose oil production restrictions.

The state is revising its flaring figures for September after receiving amended information from a major operator.

The Department of Mineral Resources initially reported that the industry captured 83 percent of natural gas statewide in September, missing the gas capture target for the first time since the policy was adopted.

Now the agency says companies captured 85 percent of gas from Bakken and Three Forks wells after Oasis Petroleum submitted new figures that corrected an error caused by a software system upgrade.

The important question to ask is whether companies not meeting the guidelines were given permission to flare by the NDIC. More from the linked story:

The flaring is more severe on the Fort Berthold Reservation, where companies captured 71 percent of natural gas in September, or flared 29 percent.

The state’s gas capture target increases to 88 percent in November 2018. Director of Mineral Resources Lynn Helms said that target is going to be challenging for industry to meet without significant investment in processing plants and other infrastructure.

Sinclair was the worst offender and has been told to reduce production to 3,000 bbls/month.