I finally had a chance to listen to EPA’s webinar on their report “Analysis of Hydraulic Fracturing Fluid Data from the FracFocus Chemical Disclosure Registry 1.0”. If you read my April 6, 2015 post on the report, than you can skip the hour long webinar which is located at (http://www2.epa.gov/hfstudy/epa-analysis-fracfocus-10-data-webinar-presentation) because there’s not much information in the webinar other than what I already covered in my post. However, EPA did give a timeframe for when we can expect their final assessment report of hydraulic fracturing. EPA didn’t give a precise date but said it would be issued later in the Spring of 2015.
Category Archives: Environmental Impacts
Impacts on water of human activity
EPA’s Latest Report on Hydrofracturing: Analysis of Hydraulic Fluid Data from FracFocus
On Friday March 27, 2015, EPA announced the availability of their latest peer reviewed report from their overall Hydrofracturing Study. Congress asked EPA to conduct the Hydrofracturing Study to determine the impacts of the hydrofracturing process on water. One of the analyses EPA identified in their overall Study Plan was the need to determine the constituents of hydrofracturing fluid. What exactly is being used in the process? Another analysis EPA identified in their Study Plan is how much water is being used in hydrofracturing and what is its source? In order to answer these questions, EPA sent out and collected data from a large number of operators who are conducting hydrofracturing operations. The other source of information was collected from data disclosed in FracFocus. Not familiar with FracFocus? Well head on over to their website (http://fracfocus.org) if you are interested in hydrofacturing. It is a source of great information. In addition to information on the hydrofracturing process, FracFocus also serves as a disclosure site for hydrofracturing operations. What are they disclosing? Those very things that EPA is interested in: What are the chemicals being used in hydrofracturing and how much water is being used. EPA has published an analysis of the FracFocus information in this newly issued report. The report is aptly named “Analysis of Hydraulic Fracturing Fluid Data from the FracFocus Chemical Disclosure Registry 1.0”.
I have taken a look at the report and not surprisingly EPA discovered what so many other people do when trying to analyze a database for a purpose for which the database was not intended. The FracFocus database was meant for disclosure of chemicals and water used in hydrofracturing of individual wells. EPA has tried to use the information in the database to determine and this is right from the report: “(1) what are the identities and quantities of chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing fluids, and how might this composition vary at a given site and across the country? and (2) how much water is used in hydraulic fracturing and what are the sources of this water?” So EPA was sort of able to make some conclusions, but the report is caveated with all sorts of limitations on the ability to use the data in the report to answer their two questions.
A lot of the trouble EPA encountered was the conversion of the data from FracFocus. That data is in the PDF format. EPA had to bring all that data from the PDF format into a database. So there were problems with conversion. EPA says the conversion potentially resulted in some errors. Operators filling out the data in FracFocus also made errors, so a number of chemical numbers entered by the operators were actually not valid numbers and EPA could not use them to identify the chemical. In addition EPA found the data in FracFocus incomplete because some operators designated ingredients in their additives as Confidential Business Information. Another issue EPA raised about the usefulness of the information in FracFocus was the wide variety of reporting on sources of water for hydrofracturing fluid. A lot of operators reported using fresh water but didn’t give any information on whether it was surface water or groundwater.
In other words some of the data was usable but EPA cautioned about the completeness and accuracy of the data. None the less, EPA has once again done a masterful job at taking the data and making some sense out of it.
To let you know what a big job this was, EPA used all of the disclosures in FracFocus over a period of almost two years between January 2011 and February 2013. There were almost 39,000 disclosures. Out of that number of disclosures EPA was able to use about 38,000 to determine well locations, water volumes and whether the record was for an oil or a gas well. They were able to use about 36,500 records to determine what ingredients were being used in the hydrofracturing process.
What did EPA learn? Well there are three things that go into a hydrofracturing fluid. A base fluid (usually water), what is called a proppant (which is basically a material to hold open the fractures once they are made – this is usually silica sand), and a number of chemical ingredients that do things like making the base fluid more viscous and controlling biological growth. So for base fluid, EPA learned that the most common fluid used was water. It was used in 93 percent of the disclosures. Sometimes water was used in a mixture with other base “fluids”. And that is quoted because some of the other bases used were actually gases. Other primary bases were carbon dioxide and liquid nitrogen. EPA learned that in 2012 alone 52 billion gallons of water were used in twenty states to conduct hydrofracturing. EPA looked at the median amounts of water used per state. In Pennsylvania, operators used four million gallons per well. In North Dakota the median was two million per well and in Texas it was about one and a half million per well. Remember median is where half of the number of something is greater and half is less. The ranges were extremely variable.
EPA also learned that most operators are using “fresh” water as a base fluid. It was identified in 68 percent of the disclosures. Although EPA was quick to point out that the actual source of the water was not identified. So they don’t know if the source was surface water or groundwater. The thing I found interesting was the state breakdown on water source. I mentioned in an earlier post that more operators are using recycled water now. Of the three states I mentioned above (Pennsylvania, North Dakota and Texas), Pennsylvania seems to be the leader in recycled water use. I would have thought it would be the other way around, with the drier states like North Dakota and Texas leading the way.
EPA learned that quartz sand is the prevalent proppant being used. It was used in 98 percent of the disclosures. In fact ninety percent of the disclosures only used quartz sand as a proppant.
EPA identified 692 unique ingredients being used in additives for hydrofracturing fluid. The most common additives were methanol, hydrochloric acid and hydrotreated light petroleum distillates. I think most people know what methanol and hydrochloric acid are, but even I don’t know what a hydrotreated light petroleum distillate is. So I checked out the Material Safety Data Sheet on it. It is a mixture and not a single chemical, therefore the fancy name. And its name is really more of a description of how it is made. EPA found that 20, out of the 692 identified ingredients, were more commonly used as additives in hydrofracturing fluid and that the more commonly used ingredients were different for hydrofracturing oil wells versus gas wells. These chemical ingredients were found to be less than one percent by mass of the total fluid, with base fluid being 88 percent of the total, and proppants another 10 percent.
This report is a great overview of the industry. It gives a good summary of the amounts of water used, the source of the water and the most common ingredients used in additives. To me what would be most interesting next is for EPA to look at the mobility of these additives in water. Will a chemical ingredient easily mix with water and move along with the water? Not all chemicals do. Some adhere to soil and rock. Some are too dense.
EPA held a webinar on this latest report on Monday March 30, 2015 and has promised to post the webinar soon. I’ll look out for it and let you know if EPA had anything to say about what is coming next from their Hydrofracturing Study.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s Enormous Study of Hydrofracturing’s Potential Impact on Water
I guess I should have paid more attention when I attended those webinars that EPA held regarding their Hydrofracturing Study. Their study is huge and wide-ranging. It is certainly about more than simply what underground mechanisms could transport natural gas and hydrofracturing fluid to people’s domestic water wells. And after reading the project plan and the 2012 update on research, I can see why they haven’t published a final report. This is an enormous endeavor. EPA does say though, that they are close to getting a draft report out for peer review and public review. They were supposed to have a final report at the end of 2014, but I think that was very optimistic considering the scientific studies they had planned.
In addition to looking at subsurface mechanisms for contamination of drinking water wells by hydrofracturing activities, EPA is also looking at potential routes of contamination caused by surface spills of hydrofracturing fluids and what is called flushback water. Flushback water is simply the hydrofracturing fluid coming back up the cased hole once the fracture of the oil and gas formation is completed. It makes sense that EPA is looking at potential for contamination of drinking water aquifers from spills of flushback water. It is certainly a likely scenario if drill pads are not bermed or if fluids fill an unlined area.
And you know that hydrofracturing fluid. Well it is more than 98% water. That water has to come from somewhere, so EPA is researching impacts to available water resources in an area. This makes sense as well, since the amount of water involved is not trivial. EPA says up to 13 million gallons can be needed to conduct hydrofracturing. Of course the exact amount of water is going to be variable depending on a lot of engineering factors. It might not be a big concern say in Pennsylvania where there is a lot of water available. But think about Texas and North Dakota. Those are some pretty dry states that have serious oil and gas development. The good thing is that many oil and gas companies have gone to treating and recycling water that they use for hydrofracture, so it will be interesting to see what EPA’s final conclusions are. And in all fairness, other energy development, such as solar power, uses a lot of water in dry environments as well.
What I find really interesting though is EPA’s proposed research on treatment and disposal of hydraulic fracture wastewater. A lot of wastewater from hydrofracturing is disposed of through underground injection, a permitted activity under Underground Injection Control regulations. But a good bit of wastewater in Pennsylvania has been disposed through Publically Owned Treatment Works (POTWs). Those are your local city and county treatment plants that treat mostly sewer water. EPA will also be looking at Commercially Owned Treatment Plants where more of your industrial wastewater gets treated. Why the EPA interest, you ask? Here’s the deal. Some people are concerned that POTWs are unable to adequately treat hydrofracture wastewater. The wastewater contains a lot of chloride and bromide and what is termed NORM or naturally occurring radioactive material. NORM is not an additive. NORM comes from the formation being fractured and comes back up with the fracturing fluid. So if it is not being treated it goes out into the river at the POTWs discharge point. Downstream from the POTWs are city and county intakes for public water supply. The river water captured for water supply is treated for public consumption. EPA wants to see if the treatment plants for the public water supply are capable of treating the river water to EPA’s drinking water standards.
More about these different studies in posts to come.
Does Hydrofracturing Used in Oil and Gas Development Really Contaminate Water Wells?
We’ve all seen the pictures in the paper or on the TV news. A homeowner opens their kitchen tap or outdoor faucet, takes a lighter, and sets the water on fire. Very cool, huh? But it’s probably not very cool to the homeowner. The homeowner has natural gas in their water. They are worried that the natural gas got into their well from a process called hydraulic fracturing or hydrofracturing for short (some people even shorten the term to just fracking). Hydrofracturing is being widely used to develop oil and gas resources in what are called “tight” shales. In addition to natural gas, homeowners also worry that chemicals used during hydrofracturing may end up in their drinking water wells.
I’m a geologist and have worked in the environmental field for some 30 years. So I get the question all the time from people. Is it really possible for the hydrofracturing process to contaminate people’s water wells with natural gas? My off the cuff response has always been, oh no, I don’t see how it is possible. Oil and gas development is really deep – a mile or more beneath the surface. Most groundwater wells are much shallower. There are miles of rock between where the oil and gas is located and where the groundwater is. And on top of that, oil and gas companies use cement to protect groundwater resources during hydrofracturing. As they are drilling, they insert steel casing into the hole. To protect groundwater they cement the area between the rock and the casing.
But what about those pictures of burning water, people ask? In areas where there are lots of oil and gas resources, water may have natural methane in it. Maybe the homeowner just never tried to light their water before. I further explain that in the 1800’s drillers often located oil resources from the natural oil seeps they would find at the surface. Scientists have even documented methane seeps on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico where we all know there is a ton of oil and gas wells.
The problem with many scientists like me is that we often give these off the cuff assessments based on limited knowledge. I’ve been a little uncomfortable about my response because frankly I haven’t followed the science on the issue. So I decided, if I’m going to provide some expertise on the subject instead of admitting I just don’t know, I had better inform myself about the science. Now the good thing is that I had been following the hydrofracturing controversy (just a little bit) a few years back and I know that the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and the United States Geological Survey have been working on a series of studies to answer the questions so many people have about hydrofracturing. Like how effective is that cementing in preventing gas and hydrofracturing fluid from getting into groundwater? What are some of the ways that gas and hydrofracturing fluids could get from those deep rocks where the oil and gas is being developed into people’s much shallower water wells? Are gases and fluids migrating upward along faults and fractures through thousands of feet of rock? Or are those fluids and gases coming up through old abandoned oil and gas wells that were never properly cemented or plugged?
It’s been several years since EPA, DOE and the USGS embarked on these studies. I think it was in 2011 that I first heard about them. So I thought what the heck, I’ll just get onto EPA’s website and see what they have to say. I’m sure they will have issued some scientific reports by now. I’ll read them and then the next person who asks me about the possibility of the hydrofracturing process contaminating groundwater will get a better informed answer. I’ll let you know what I find out.