A report from the Department of Transportation this week indicated that Americans put 283.7 billion miles on their vehicles in July, 4.2% more than they did last July...on a seasonally adjusted basis, that was 0.8% more miles than we drove in June, and the 12 month average thus set another new record for any 12 month period in US history...prior to this year, our miles driven had stayed below the previous peak for 85 months, but with lower gas prices starting last fall, we broke out of the downward trend in January and have been setting records for miles driven ever since...also this week, an Energy Information Administration report showed that US gasoline sales had surged 5% in July, the fastest growth in US gasoline consumption in a decade...note that the reason that our gasoline consumption is rising faster than our miles driven is that we're buying and driving larger vehicles; recall that just 3 weeks ago, we reported on car sales for August, which showed that 57.3% of August light vehicle sales were built on a truck frame...those big vehicles typically use nearly 40 percent more fuel to cover the same mileage than smaller passenger cars...
Other than that, i haven't seen any news out of the ordinary enough this week that would be worth exploring any further than what the links below provide, nor do i have any particular insights to share, so today we'll just review the weekly oil stats from the EIA and the rig count data from Baker Hughes and wrap it up...
This week's reports showed that US field production of crude oil rose for the first time in 8 weeks, from 9,117,000 barrels per day during the week ending September 11th to 9,136,000 barrels per day for the week ending September 18th...putting that production into perspective, that's about 4.9% below the modern record production of 9,610,000 barrels per day that was set in the first week of June this year, a bit more than 3% above our production rate of 8,867,000 barrels per day in the 3rd week of September a year ago, and roughly 64.4% higher than our 5,556,000 barrel per day production of 5 years ago...to help you visualize how our output of oil has changed, we'll include a copy of the EIA graph that accompanies the production data that we cite every week, from which we have excised the not particularly relevant period between 1990 and 2003 so the graph would better fit on the page…
field production of crude oil as of 9/18:
from that graph we can see how our domestic production of crude generally declined from the 90s till it bottomed out over the 2006 to 2008 span, before it started rising as hydraulic fracking technology, which had been used earlier in shale gas basins, was extended to be used in oil bearing shale...then, from the period starting in 2012, US production of crude began to increase exponentially, as fracking activity spread across several basins, fed by cheap interest rates and high oil prices...also note that although the number of active oil drilling rigs started to decrease late last year, it wasn't until June that our oil production seriously turned down..
our other main source of oil supply is from imports, which have remained stubbornly high over the past two years even as US oil production had been rising....in the week ending September 18th, our imports of crude oil were little changed, falling from 7,189,000 barrels per day in the week ending September 11th to 7,176,000 barrels per day in this week's report...while that's 4.5% higher than the same week a year ago, weekly oil imports are volatile, so we check the 4 week average of imports carried in the weekly Petroleum Status Report (62 pp pdf) which indicates U.S. crude oil imports averaged 7.4 million barrels per day over the last 4 weeks, 2.0% below the same 4 weeks last year...
so, with oil imports down a bit and oil production up a bit, domestic supplies of crude were little changed this
week...however, refinery operations slowed from last week, as they typically do once the summer driving peak is past, as U.S. crude oil refinery inputs averaged 16,203,000 barrels per day in the week ending September 18, down from 16,513,000 barrels per day in the prior week...the refinery utilization rate dropped to 90.9%, from 93.1% of capacity last week, with no news as to why; that kind of drop is typical for the end of September and the beginning of October, however, so perhaps they're downshifting refinery operations a bit early this year...
users still took oil out of storage this week, however, although less so than last week...in the week ending September 18th, our commercial crude oil inventories in storage fell to 453,969,000 barrels, down from the 455,894,000 barrels we had stored as of the 11th...however, that is still 26.8% more oil in storage than the 357,998,000 barrels of oil that we had stored in the same week last year, and the highest for the 3rd week in September in the 80 years that such records have been kept, which had never seen more than 400 million barrels stored before this year...we made a copy of the EIA graph that accompanies the inventory data too, so we can all get a look at what that looks like historically...and like we did above, we have excised the period between 1990 and 2003 so the graph would better fit on the page…
inventories of crude as of 9/18:
here we can see that our oil inventories had remained in the same range, somewhat below 400 million barrels, over the entire past three decades, only gradually approaching that 400 million barrel mark in 2013, before suddenly spiking at the end of January of this year...what we see on this chart also belies the analysis of Reuters energy analyst Jack Kemp, who has been claiming that inventories are tighter than they look, because much more of our inventory is now in transit in railcars, pipelines and barges, or in in situ storage in the oil fields, than it was previous to widespread fracking...it's clear from both the chart and from the weekly data that our inventories spiked during the same weeks when oil prices fell the most, leaving contracts for oil to be delivered in the future at a price somewhat higher than the spot price, setting up the contango trade we've talked about previously, wherein speculators bought oil on the cheap and paid for its storage, and simultaneously entered into a contract to sell it back at a higher price in the future...if there had been a structural change in the amount of oil stored occurring, it would have happened gradually over a period of several years, not in a quick spike when oil prices fell...
meanwhile, oilfield drilling activity slowed again this week, but not by as much as it had in the past four weeks, as the total active rig count fell by just 4 to 838 rigs for the week ending September 25th...Baker Hughes reported that rigs drilling for oil in the US decreased from 644 last week to 640 this week, that rigs drilling for gas fell from 198 to 197, and drillers added one miscellaneous rig for the first time in two months....active oil rigs are still above the 5 year low of 628 which they fell to on June 26th, but down 952 from the year ago count of 1592 and down 969 from the high of 1609 hit on October 10th of last year, while active gas rigs are down from 338 a year ago and down by 159 from the recent peak of 356 gas rigs that were operating during the week of November 11th, 2014....
there were two drilling operations started in the Gulf of Mexico this week, so the Gulf rig count is up to 31, and with rigs off Alaska and California, the offshore count is up to 33, but that's still down from 62 in the same week last year....horizontal drillers took a big hit this week, as the count for that type of rig was down 11 to 629, and down from 1347 horizontal rigs in the same week last year...active vertical rigs, on the other hand, increased by 4 to 123, which was still well off the 373 that were drilling a year ago...and directional rigs increased also, up by 3 to 86, but are still down from the 211 directional rigs that were deployed last year at this time..
the major shale basins saw an even greater reduction in rigs; both the Permian and Eagle Ford shale of Texas, as well as the Haynesville shale of the Louisiana-Texas border, each saw 3 rigs stacked...in addition, single rigs were shut down in the Ardmore Woodford of Oklahoma, the Barnett shale of the Dallas Fort Worth region, the Fayetteville of Arkansas, the Granite Wash of the Oklahoma-Texas border and the Williston of North Dakota...those decreases left the Permian with 250 rigs, down from 556 a year ago, the Eagle Ford with 85, down from 207 a year earlier, the Haynesville with 26, down from 46 a year ago, the Ardmore Woodford with 4, down from 5 last year, the Barnett shale with 6, down from 22 a year ago, the Fayetteville with 3, down from 9 a year ago, the Granite Wash with 12, down from 66 a year ago, and the Williston with 67, down from 198 a year ago...
even with all the rigs removed from Texas shale plays, the state rig count only fell by 2 to 363, as apparently most of the vertical and directional rigs added were in that state...that was still down by 534 rigs from the 897 rigs that were active in Texas on the 4th weekend of September last year...other states that saw less rigs this week corresponded with the basin decreases; Arkansas was down a rig to 3, and down from 12 rigs a year ago, North Dakota was down 1 rig to 66 and down from 189 a year ago, and the Oklahoma rig count was also down by 1 to 105, which was down from 213 rigs a year earlier...the only state to see an increase in active rigs was New Mexico, which was up 1 to 50 this week, but down from 101 a year earlier...net rigs counts for all other states remained unchanged this week, although as we've noted previously, that does not preclude that rigs may have been stacked in one area of a state and started up in another....
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Ohio has 1,591 drilled Utica wells, 1,009 producing Utica wells - Drilling - Ohio: Ohio has approved 2,013 Utica Shale drilling permits, as of Sept. 19. That total includes 1,591 drilled Uitca wells and 1,009 producing Utica wells. Ohio has 22 drilling rigs at work. Fifteen new permits were approved: four in Belmont County, four in Guernsey County, five in Harrison County and two in Noble County.
Ohioans deserve to get fair fracking tax - Columbus Dispatch -- It’s been three years since Gov. John Kasich started pleading with state legislators and drillers to come up with a reasonable severance tax. It’s been three months since Senate President Keith Faber said he and his colleagues couldn’t come up with one in time to be included in the biennial budget, but promised they were setting a “ hard deadline” of Oct. 1 by which a legislative study commission would come up with a plan. It is now less than three weeks until that deadline. One small problem: It since has come out that the budget language to create the study group doesn’t technically take effect until Sept. 30 — just one day before the Oct. 1 deadline. Most Ohioans surely are weary of seeing lawmakers cater to drillers, many of whom are based out of state and make big political contributions. Residents of Ohio, like those in other states with higher “fracking” taxes, deserve better compensation for nonrenewable natural resources being extracted. Kasich wants this money to go toward further income-tax reduction for state residents, not pad state coffers or fund government bloat. But the legislature has resisted, either offering nothing or, in the case of an earlier House proposal, an amount Kasich saw as so “puny” that he called it a “big, fat joke.” Meanwhile, the 4.5 percent (natural gas and liquids) to 6.5 percent (oil and gas) tax proposed by Kasich has been judged fair by independent analyses. The oil and gas industry has predictably launched a counterattack, hoping to keep the sweet deal it has in Ohio. In addition to lobbying and writing checks to legislators, the American Petroleum Institute several months ago ran a radio advertising campaign repeating its claims that increasing taxes on fracking would kill the industry in Ohio. Drillers will go where the oil is and won’t be chased off by a modest increase in severance taxes.
Ohio lawmakers will miss promised deadline on fracking tax report - – Ohio lawmakers said this week they won't meet a self-imposed Oct. 1 deadline to hammer out recommendations on an oil and gas severance tax deal, as they need more time for negotiations. The impasse is the latest delay in a years-long effort to tap into a potentially lucrative source of revenue to pay for income-tax cuts and funding to local governments in eastern Ohio, where drilling activity is ramping up. In June, House and Senate leaders held a rare joint news conference to announce that a legislative study committee would work over the summer to reach a compromise agreement on raising taxes on fracking activity. Senate President Keith Faber, a Mercer County Republican, told reporters that Oct. 1 was a "hard deadline" to compile recommendations on a compromise between industry groups, which oppose any severance tax increase, and Gov. John Kasich's administration, which has called for a major tax hike. At the time, Faber disputed that sending the issue to a study group was "just a stalling tactic."
Ohio injection well program gets high marks from U.S. EPA, some areas need improvement -- Results of a federal review of Ohio’s injection well program led to a U.S. Environmental Agency official describing it as a “good quality program.” Tinka Hyde, director of the Water Division in EPA’s Region 5, made the comment in a cover letter to Richard Simmers, chief of the Ohio Division of Oil and Gas Resources (part of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources). The EPA issued a final report on Sept. 8 of a review of Ohio’s Class II injection well program. Class II injection wells are used to dispose of fluids brought to the surface in the process of production of oil and natural gas. Concerns have been raised by environmental groups and others about chemicals used to “frack” oil and gas wells. As part of the review, the EPA examined files from 29 injection wells, including two K&H Partners injections wells in Athens County’s Troy Twp. and the Ginsburg well on Ladd Ridge Road, east of Albany. The previous review was in 2009. “EPA found that Ohio runs a good quality program for Class II wells, and is administering the program in accordance with (EPA) approval,” Hyde wrote. “The program is strong in several areas, including permitting, inspections and resolving violations found during inspections.” Hyde wrote that Ohio has invested “significant new resources in the program” and described Ohio as “a leader in terms of addressing seismic potential during the review of permit applications and well operations.” Hyde wrote that Ohio should improve its program by:
• Identifying operator reporting gaps or inaccuracies and taking enforcement action for violations of reporting requirements.
• Escalating enforcement for recalcitrant and repeat violators. (EPA found instances where operators repeated violations or where the same operating violations were noted in successive inspection reports at a well site, without documentation of ODNR compliance or enforcement action, according to the report.)
Thousands of petroleum leak investigations backlogged in Ohio — More than 35,000 petroleum leaks have been reported in Ohio since the state began monitoring underground storage tanks in the mid-1980s, and about 12 percent of them are still in need of cleanup years or even decades later. Ohio has a current backlog of about 4,300 active cases, according to the Ohio Bureau of Underground Storage Tank Regulations. Most of them involve vacant properties — an old gas station or abandoned factory — where an owner can’t be tracked down to take responsibility for the testing, cleanup and monitoring of a suspected or confirmed leak. “We do not have a responsible party to address those situations,” said Verne Ord, BUSTR assistant bureau chief. It could be because the company has gone out of business, declared bankruptcy or the owner may have died, he said. In some cases they simply can’t afford the cleanup. Without someone to take responsibility, the case sits open, sometimes for decades. Nearly three quarters of the 48 active cases in Clark County involve leaks detected between 1988 and 1999. “If you’ve got one that’s that old, it’s been either a really bad petroleum release that’s taken years to remedy, or we don’t have a viable, responsible party,” Ord said. About half of Champaign County’s 23 open cases have been open longer than 15 years and about half involve non-viable owners.
Government and Gas Industry Team Up Against Local Fracking Ban Initiatives in Ohio - Last week the Supreme Court of Ohio upheld the Ohio Secretary of State’s decision to remove from this November’s ballot, measures by Medina, Fulton, and Athens counties that would have banned hydraulic fracturing and related infrastructure projects. However, in a separate ruling, the court allowed the city of Youngstown to proceed with an anti-fracking charter amendment and ordered it be placed on the November 3 ballot. Secretary of State Jon Husted had removed the county ballot measures in August, claiming “unfettered authority” even though all three initiatives had gathered sufficient signatures. The court did not agree with Husted’s argument that there was “nothing to materially limit the scope of [his] legal review of the petitions.” It’s ruling against the initiatives was based on a technicality. Terry Lodge, a lawyer for the petitioners, told Earth Island Journal “we don't agree that the [initiatives] are in any way deficient.” According to Lodge, the argument that local initiatives that challenge state preemption should not be allowed a vote, never stood a chance in court. “The only role of governmental regulation over initiative petitions,” Lodge said, “is to verify that the signatures were collected on the proper forms, that they were properly verified by the circulator, and that the form in which the petition wording was circulated was proper. The county boards of election and the Secretary of State may not indulge an inquiry into whether, if passed, something might be ruled illegal.” The oil and gas industry played a key role too. Rather than rely on the state attorney general for legal representation — as state actors most often do — Husted brought on the private law firm, Bricker & Eckler LLP, to defend his August decision. Bricker & Eckler is not just any law firm; it’s the firm that represents the very company — Spectra Energy — that is trying to build a massive, hotly contested, natural gas pipeline which two of the local bans would have blocked. The proposed NEXUS pipeline would traverse Northern Ohio en route to exporting gas to Ontario and thence international markets.
Community hears about proposed methane regulations -- richlandsource.com: The public was invited to give its input on input on the Environmental Protection Agency’s recent draft proposal to reduce national methane emissions during an informational session. The event was held Thursday evening in the community room at the North End Community Improvement Collaborative.The meeting was put together by Bill Baker, organizer for Frack Free Ohio, in collaboration with Sierra Club, the Ohio Environmental Council, and Moms Clean Air Force.. The purpose of the session was to educate locals on the new EPA draft proposal for methane regulations, which are targeted at the oil and gas industry, as well as hydraulic fracturing operations. “Frack Free Ohio’s mission is not just to protest against fossil fuel development but also to teach people about alternatives,” Baker said. “And until we really look at how much pollution’s being created, we’re not going to really look at the alternatives and the other solutions.” Presenters during the meeting included Laura Burns, Ohio organizer of Moms Clean Air Force; Cheryl Johncox, of Sierra Club; Melanie Houston, of the Ohio Environmental Council; and Mansfield City Councilman Don Bryant.
Youngstowners yet again can reject fracking issue - Youngstown Vindicator --A ruling by the Ohio Supreme Court that will result in the anti-fracking charter amendment appearing on the November ballot in Youngstown does not change this fact: The amendment will be unconstitutional even if it is approved by the voters. Indeed, it’s a big “if,” given that Youngstown residents have rejected the ban on fracking four times – twice in 2014 and twice in 2013. Last November, the so-called Community Bill of Rights was summarily dismissed by a vote of 7,231 to 5,268. In the May 2014 primary, the charter amendment went down to defeat 3,674 to 3,100. So, what was the Supreme Court ruling about? It had nothing to do with the merits or constitutionality of the anti-fracking proposal. Rather, the justices were acting on a motion filed by the city of Youngstown to order the Mahoning County Board of Elections to place the constitutional amendment issue on the Nov. 3 general-election ballot. The board had voted 4-0 not to certify the citizen-initiative amendment, thus preventing it from being included on the ballot. The city, led by Mayor John A. McNally and Law Director Martin Hume, argued in its motion for a writ of mandamus that the board of elections had acted illegally and had violated the constitutional separation of powers. The Supreme Court agreed, saying the elections officials do not have the authority “to sit as arbiters of the legality or constitutionality of a ballot measure’s substantive terms. “An unconstitutional amendment may be a proper item for referendum or initiative,” the court ruled. “Such an amendment becomes void and unenforceable only when declared unconstitutional by a court of competent jurisdiction.” Let there be no doubt about how a court of competent jurisdiction will rule if the Community Bill of Rights is passed by the voters and then challenged in court. After all, the Ohio Supreme Court already has ruled in another case that only the Ohio Department of Natural Resources has authority over oil and gas drilling in the state.
Judge tosses landowners' lawsuit against fracking opponents (AP) — A judge has dismissed a lawsuit that landowners filed against people and groups who oppose fracking in a western Pennsylvania township. Natural gas drilling has been delayed in Middlesex, Butler County, while some of the rural community’s 800 residents challenge a zoning ordinance that would allow drilling in 90 percent of the rural township. Dewey Homes and Investment Properties and 12 landowners sued the drilling opponents, seeking damages for royalties they’ve been unable to collect from gas drilling companies who have leases to drill on their land. But the residents and environmental groups challenged that litigation as a strategic lawsuit against public participation, or SLAPP suit, meant to silence their opposition and free-speech rights. An attorney for the landowners hasn’t said whether he’ll appeal Thursday’s ruling, which dismissed the lawsuit for not being specific enough.
Two Marcellus pipeline projects move forward -- Two large pipeline projects aimed at alleviating a glut of natural gas coming from the Marcellus shale moved ahead in the federal permitting process this week. Houston-based Columbia Pipeline Group said its proposal to build the $2 billion, 165-mile Mountaineer Xpress in West Virginia entered a pre-filing phase before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Moving from Marshall County to Wayne County along the state’s western border with the Ohio River, the pipeline would connect processing points and other lines, “providing producers in the Marcellus and Utica shale areas new transportation options to move gas out of the capacity-constrained supply basin and into the interstate market,” the company said. Columbia has started reaching out to landowners in the project’s path and, pending the FERC’s approval, will start construction in the fall of 2017 with hopes to start moving 2.7 billion cubic feet of gas per day a year later. On the northeastern end of the Marcellus, a venture led by six midstream and utility companies applied to the FERC for permits to move ahead with construction of the PennEast Pipeline. The $1 billion, 118-mile system of 36-inch pipes would move gas from shale fields north of Wilkes Barre to New Jersey and the Philadelphia suburbs.
Book details railroad tracks for responders -- In 1987, rescuers had to evacuate the entire borough of Confluence when 27 tank railcars derailed in the heart of town. Two decades later, a similar scene unfolded: a CSX freight train derailed in February 2007 on the outskirts of the same town, leaving behind twisted railcars, scattered coal and ripped tracks. Both incidents happened before thousands of gallons of crude oil and ethanol from fracking ventures in North Dakota were routinely hauled through the county by rail. Responders aren’t waiting for another derailment to prepare, according to training officer Joel Landis with the Somerset County Hazmat Team. Landis helped land federal funding to organize a project to help responders prepare for railroad emergencies. The Somerset County department of emergency services secured a Hazardous Materials Emergency Preparedness grant funding through the state’s Emergency Management Agency. The result of the 10-month collaboration is a book that details tracks to help responders quickly — and uniformly — identify street access points. The book, distributed to eight volunteer fire companies, covers the CSX Keystone section of railroad that runs from Confluence to Fairhope in Somerset County. The line runs from Cumberland, Maryland, west to Connellsville, Fayette County, along a former Baltimore and Ohio Railroad line.
Proposed W.Va. pipeline accepted for pre-application review (AP) — The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission will review a proposed $2 billion natural gas pipeline in West Virginia before the developer formally submits an application. The commission notified Columbia Gas Transmission, LLC last week that it accepted the Mountaineer Xpress Project for the pre-filing review process. Parent companies Columbia Pipeline Group, Inc. and Columbia Pipeline Partners LP said Wednesday that an application will be filed with the federal commission in April 2016. If the pipeline is approved, construction would begin in the fall of 2017. The pipeline would run about 165 miles from Marshall County to Wayne County. The companies say in a news release that the pipeline would give producers in the Marcellus and Utica shale areas new options to transport gas into the interstate market.
Halliburton to pay $18.3 mln overtime wages -U.S. Labor Dept (Reuters) – Halliburton Co will pay $18.3 million to more than 1,000 oil and gas workers it improperly exempted from overtime pay, the U.S. Department of Labor said on Tuesday, the latest development in a nationwide probe into wage practices in the industry. The department said Halliburton improperly identified workers in 28 job categories as exempt from overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act, the U.S. law governing wages and working hours. The company said it had begun paying the overtime and was cooperating with the Labor Department. The settlement is one of the largest for the Labor Department in recent years in an overtime case. Under the law, employees are entitled to mandatory overtime pay only if they earn less than $455 weekly or have few or no management duties. The Obama administration recently proposed more than doubling the income threshold, rankling business groups and Republican officials. The Labor Department said Halliburton automatically exempted all salaried workers from overtime without considering their income or job duties.
UT must end worst practices of fracking - The very first well drilled on University of Texas-owned land in west Texas, Santa Rita No. 1 started producing way back in 1923. It didn’t just produce oil, but it also brought up salt water from deep underground. The salt wastewater was stored in surface ponds, which leaked into the surrounding environment and onto lands that had once been used for grazing livestock. By the 1960s, 11 square miles — more than 7,000 acres — of the former pastureland had been rendered barren. That one well was the first of thousands drilled on millions of acres of West Texas land set aside by the state government as a form of an endowment to provide revenue for revenue for the University of Texas and Texas A&M systems. Today, nearly a century after the first well was drilled, oil and gas production continues on land owned by the University of Texas. According to a new report by the Environment Texas Research and Policy Center and Frontier Group, fracking of as many as 4,132 on university-owned land in recent years has consumed enormous quantities of water, introduced vast amounts of toxic chemicals into the environment, and threatened land that is valuable to the environment and wildlife. At least 6 billion gallons of water were used on university lands amid a historic drought in which Texans were asked to scale back water use. Increasing demand for water by oil and gas companies has harmed farmers and local communities. For example, water withdrawals by drilling companies caused drinking water wells in the town of Barnhart to dry up in 2013 and 2014. Approximately, 275 million pounds of chemicals were pumped deep underground, including 92.5 million pounds of hydrochloric acid and 8.5 million pounds of methanol, which is suspected to cause birth defects. Some of those chemicals come back up to the surface, creating toxic waste. And some of them stay underground, where they can contaminate our drinking water. Either way, they’re a danger to the Texas environment.
Silicosis: another fracking field hazard that leaves scars -- What is America’s most dangerous occupation? It’s oil and gas extraction, according to a 2014 report (based on 2012 data) published by the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH).The industry’s fatality rate is now 24.2 deaths for every 100,000 full time workers vs. 3.2 deaths per 100,000 overall rate for U.S. workers. Many factors contribute to its dangerous reputation, though one is garnering lots of attention these days – the results of which happen while working unprotected around frac sand. The composition of frac sand is 99 percent crystalline silica (silica). Inhaling its dust can lead to silicosis, which causes inflammation and scarring in the lungs. If it sounds bad, it’s because it is. Once lungs succumb to silicosis, they can’t take in as much oxygen. This leads to a host of symptoms, such as becoming easily winded and fatigued. The side effects can be difficult to manage and result in a lower quality of life and premature death. Silicosis is a cumulative disease caused by breathing in silica dust, usually over longer time periods. However, according to The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), the amount inhaled and the time length of respiration greatly determines the progression of the disease. There are three classified types of silicosis that take time and amount of inhaled toxic dust into account. The most common is the chronic or classic type, in which the onset takes an average of 10-20 years. The accelerated type occurs along a shorter timeline and appears within 5-10 years. Lastly, there’s acute silicosis, characterized by rapid onset of symptoms in as little as a few months to a few years. It’s usually deadly.
How one US state went from two quakes a year to 585 - Located in the middle of the country, far from any major fault lines, Oklahoma experienced 585 earthquakes of a magnitude of 3.0 or greater in 2014. That's more than three times as many as the 180 which hit California last year."It's completely unprecedented," said George Choy, a seismologist at the US Geological Survey.As of last month, Oklahoma has already experienced more than 600 quakes strong enough to rattle windows and rock cars. The biggest was a 4.5-magnitude quake that hit the small town of Crescent. The fracking process has unlocked massive amounts of oil and gas in Oklahoma and other states over the past decade. But along with the oil and gas comes plenty of that brackish water, which is disposed of by injecting it into separate wells that are dug as deep as a mile (less than two kilometers) below ground. The unnatural addition of the water can change pressure along fault lines, causing slips that make the earth shake, said Choy of the US Geological Survey. There is debate among scientists over how large of a fault could be reawakened, and how hard that fault might shake. One camp believes Oklahoma won't see bigger than a 4.0 to 5.0-magnitude earthquake, which would be enough to break windows and knock things off shelves. Others believe a 7.0-magnitude earthquake could come about, which would be strong enough to topple buildings. "What's at risk is that when you put water into the ground, it's never going to come back out. You're putting it in places it has never been before," Choy told AFP. "The bigger the volume, the greater the area will be affected. And we don't know what the long-term effect will be."
Fracking Increases Oklahoma Earthquakes from Two a Year to Two a Day -- Earthquakes continue to rattle the frack-happy state of Oklahoma. The Sooner State has jumped from two earthquakes a year to roughly two a day, with scientists once again pinning the recent uptick on fracking. Scientists have identified that the injection of wastewater byproducts into deep underground disposal wells from fracking operations are very likely triggering the major increase of seismic activity in the central U.S. state. Oklahoma, which is not near any major fault lines, has felt 585 earthquakes that were a 3.0-magnitude or greater in 2014—three times the 180 quakes felt by California last year, the AFP reported. Last month alone, Oklahoma experienced more than 600 quakes that could shake homes and cars, with the town of Crescent hit hardest with a 4.5 whammy, the AFP said. “It’s completely unprecedented,” George Choy, a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), told AFP about the spate of recent tremors. “What’s at risk is that when you put water into the ground, it’s never going to come back out. You’re putting it in places it has never been before,” Choy told AFP. Oklahoma has about 4,500 disposal wells. Last week, the state’s public utilities commission shut two wells and slowed the disposal volume of three more, a local news station reported, after a series of earthquakes, including a 4.1, hit the city of Cushing, which holds one of the largest crude oil storage facilities in the world.
Oklahoma agency reveals new well plans in the Cushing area — The Oklahoma Corporation Commission says it is imposing new operating guidelines for oil and gas wastewater disposal wells in an area of north-central Oklahoma that has experienced frequent earthquakes. The commission says the plans were developed following an analysis of disposal well and seismicity data in the Cushing area. Officials say the guidelines will change the operation of certain oil and gas wastewater disposal wells in the area and may be altered as more data becomes available. The plan calls for two disposal wells to cease operations entirely and for three others to reduce their disposal volumes. The Oklahoma Geological Survey has said it is likely that many recent earthquakes in the state have been being triggered by the injection of wastewater from oil and natural gas drilling operations.
Exclusive: In clash with pope's climate call, U.S. Church leases drilling rights | Reuters: Casting the fight against climate change as an urgent moral duty, Pope Francis in June urged the world to phase out highly-polluting fossil fuels. Yet in the heart of U.S. oil country several dioceses and other Catholic institutions are leasing out drilling rights to oil and gas companies to bolster their finances, Reuters has found. And in one archdiocese -- Oklahoma City -- Church officials have signed three new oil and gas leases since Francis's missive on the environment, leasing documents show. On Francis' first visit to the United States this week, the business dealings suggest that some leaders of the U.S. Catholic Church are practicing a different approach to the environment than the pontiff is preaching. Catholic institutions are not forbidden from dealing with or investing in the energy industry. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' (USCCB) guidelines on ethical investing warn Catholics and Catholic institutions against investing in companies related to abortion, contraception, pornography, tobacco, and war, but do not suggest avoiding energy stocks, and do not address the ownership of energy production interests. A Reuters review of county documents found 235 oil and gas leasing deals signed by Catholic Church authorities in Texas and Oklahoma with energy and land firms since 2010, covering 56 counties across the two states. None of the Texas leases in the review were signed after the pope's encyclical.
How the Oil & Gas Industry Turned Colorado From Blue to Red - If money is speech, then it stands to reason that a very small number of very wealthy people can effectively drown out the voices of the multitude on issues they determine worthy of a shout via their checkbooks. Currently in Colorado, the issues where this money/speech is reaching the highest decibels are oil and gas extraction, aka fracking, and education issues such as the 2013 battle over Amendment 66 and the ongoing push by some for a school voucher system or other form of school choice. Even before the Supreme Court’s controversial “Citizens United” ruling, campaign finance laws had blurred the lines between dollars and words. It never seemed to matter that polls have long shown nearly 80 percent of us disagree with this notion that money is simply an extension of the voice we use to express our views and should therefore be unlimited. For decades, all that has really mattered is that the elected officials who could fix this broken system are the primary beneficiaries of its democratic shortcomings. Hence, money still talks and in Colorado, more loudly than in most places. To understand how a handful of wealthy, influential individuals, along with the oil and gas industry and a few key political operatives, have managed to play puppeteer over our state government and even the electorate is quite complicated. That’s why we’ve included seven full pages of what I refer to as “influence maps” at the end of this article.
New Fracking Report Reveals Network of Deceit - Greenpeace has teamed up with a Colorado newspaper, the Boulder Weekly, to rip the thin veneer of academic cred away from the fracking industry’s PR blitz in the state. According to the report, entitled Frackademia, the lobbying effort pivoted on industry-funded research conducted at the University of Colorado, Boulder Leeds School of Business. Greenpeace itself was marked as a “Big Green Radical” in a separate oil and gas industry lobbying effort last year meant to undermine the credibility of several high-profile environmental groups, but apparently name-calling is not a particularly effective tactic against the organization. In Colorado, local communities face an uphill climb when it comes to banning fracking, an oil and gas drilling method that involves pumping millions of gallons of chemical brine underground at high pressure. The oil and gas industry has successfully taken cities to court over local fracking bans, and cash-strapped communities are an uneven match with the industry’s legal teams. High court decisions in Ohio and New Mexico have also cast a long shadow of doubt over the legal authority of local communities to restrict state-regulated energy sector activities. Zoning also factors into the fracking fight in Pennsylvania. In that state, one result of former Gov. Tom “wardrobe malfunction” Corbett’s ties to the fossil fuel industry was an attempt to impose statewide zoning regulations in support of fracking. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled against the new zoning scheme in 2013, and it also affirmed the right of local communities to impose fracking bans under their zoning powers. Pennsylvania’s new governor, Tom Wolf, reinstated a ban on fracking in state parks and forests when he took office in January, and under his tenure the state is cracking down on drilling violations. But he seems to have taken a statewide ban off the table, at least for now.
US panel: Cancel drilling lease near Glacier National Park — A federal panel recommended Monday that the U.S. government cancel a long-suspended drilling lease on land near Montana’s Glacier National Park that is considered sacred to Native American tribes. The recommendation by the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation comes as Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based Solenex is suing the U.S. government to lift the decades-old suspension on the lease in the Badger-Two Medicine area of the Lewis and Clark National Forest. The development would be so damaging to the area “that the Blackfeet Tribe’s ability to practice their religious and cultural traditions in this area as a living part of their community life and development would be lost,” the council said in its recommendation. Even the company’s plans to reduce the effects of drilling wouldn’t be enough to counter the damage that would be done, it said. The council recommended revoking Solenex’s suspended permit to drill, canceling the lease and ensuring that future mineral development does not occur. The advisory council’s recommendation is the first of a multi-step process to either cancel the lease or proceed with drilling. The council analyzed the effects of drilling on the historic and cultural value of the land, and its recommendations will be considered by the U.S. Forest Service and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, which will make the final decision.
Oil company officials laud findings on crude oil volatility - Preliminary research and comments by several federal agencies on the volatility of crude oil from North Dakota shows that Bakken crude has been unfairly singled out in safety discussions, oil industry representatives said Tuesday. The makeup of crude oil from the Bakken formation has been at the forefront because of several fiery train derailments, including one in December 2013 outside Casselton that created a huge fireball and several explosions. Some regulators have said that Bakken crude is more flammable than other crude oils. American Petroleum Industry spokeswoman Beth Treseder told oil company officials who were in Fargo for the North Dakota Petroleum Council’s annual meeting that several agencies appear to debunk that notion. She cited comments last week by National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Christopher Hart, who said volatility is not a significant issue. “If it derails and the product is released, our accident experience has shown that the biggest contributor to a large explosion or fire is how much product is released rather than that volatility of the product,” Hart told Fargo radio station KFGO. Treseder said findings by the Department of Transportation, Department of Energy and Federal Railroad Administration seem to point to the same conclusion. She said DOT officials told federal lawmakers that the vapor pressure of Bakken crude was “not outside the norm” for light crude oils.
North Dakota set to extend deadline for gas flaring rules -- North Dakota is poised to give the energy industry up to two extra years to curb the amount of natural gas burned off at oil wells, a move that would ease worries pipeline construction delays make it impossible to meet aggressive flaring standards. Governor Jack Dalrymple and the two other members of the North Dakota Industrial Commission (NDIC), who spent months last year finalizing the rules, will mull oil companies’ request for the extension at their Thursday meeting. “These were lofty goals, but things have changed a bit and we’ve got to take that into consideration,” Doug Goehring, an NDIC member and the state’s agriculture commissioner, said in an interview. “We’re probably going to have to extend the deadline.” Goehring, who said low commodity prices will influence his vote, has an outsized influence over oil regulation due to his seat on the NDIC. Environmentalists oppose any extension and note the volume of gas flared in the state continues to rise as more oil wells are drilled, despite the best intentions of existing regulations.
New CBR Loading Facility Almost Ready To Start Shipping -- Palermo, ND -- September 21, 2015 On my