Dirtier Than We Had Ever Imagined.

Oil and gas fracking doesn't draw the same attention in Canada as it has attracted in the United States. It's probably fair to say that most of us hardly think of it at all. That could be about to change.

Two new studies into fracking operations in western Canada show that fracking generally and the LNG industry in particular are far dirtier, leaking massively more methane, than we had been led to believe.

A peer-reviewed study appearing in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions used measurements in the field to estimate that methane emissions from B.C.’s shale gas basins are now at least 2.5 times higher than provincial government estimates.

That makes the oil and gas sector the largest source of climate pollution in B.C., a greater source of pollution than commercial transportation.

Based on measurements from mobile methane detectors driven around in a Dodge truck, the study found that just the drilling part of the industry in the B.C. portion of the Montney Formation, a 29,850 square-kilometre siltstone area in Western Canada, is releasing 111,800 tonnes of methane a year into the atmosphere.

That is equivalent to burning more than 4.5 million tonnes of coal or putting more than two million cars on the road. Half of B.C.’s fracked gas currently comes from the Montney. The study did not look at methane leaks from pipelines or gas processing plants.

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More than 130 scientists recently criticized the federal government for assessing the climate change impact of a proposed Petronas LNG terminal in B.C. by using unverified and unrealistically small estimates of methane leakage.

All LNG environmental assessments in the province to date have used a questionable methane leakage rate of 0.28 per cent estimated by the B.C. government — one of the lowest rates on the continent.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency calculates that most natural gas operations lose about 1.33 per cent of their product, while some sites have recorded leakage rates as high as nine per cent. Leakage rates above three per cent make methane as dirty as coal in terms of direct impact on climate change. 

But Wait, There's More

Meanwhile, another study found that methane leaks pose an even graver problem in Alberta, home to more than 300,000 oil and gas wells. (B.C. currently has 25,000 wells, but LNG developments could add 150,000 wells in the Montney Formation alone.)

To back up its case, the environmental group reviewed the findings of a 2017 study by the Alberta Energy Regulator and GreenPath Energy, which found that “the actual emissions at oil and gas facilities from pneumatic devices are 60 per cent higher than estimates used to compile Canada’s GHG inventory.”

Pneumatic devices, mostly powered by methane, help to pump and control the flow of gas from well sites and other facilities. Most vent methane directly to the atmosphere too.

The GreenPath Energy study measured leaks from pneumatic devices at 395 sites and almost 700 wells at six locations in Alberta and identified 77 major leaks via infrared cameras and direct methane vents from 236 pieces of equipment. GreenPath Energy is a Calgary-based company that specializes in managing greenhouse gas emissions.

The researchers found that 95 per cent of the pneumatic devices at conventional oil and gas facilities vented methane and other gases such as benzene. Oil well sites leaked the most methane.

If you're not conversant with the fracking process and perils, this video may help.

You Can't Feed Your Kids Oil, But Eating Is Overrated Anyway.

It's been here for a while.  It's what happens when you begin to run short on something everybody needs.

It's America's frackers versus America's farmers.  They both want water and there's not enough to go around.  Frackers want it to get oil and gas out of the ground.  Farmers need it to grow food.

This is only just getting started but, this year, an estimated 1.2-billion dollars of corn, soya and wheat crops are at risk to the industrial demand for scarce water.

...industrial water users typically have a higher capacity to absorb the increased costs associated with rising water prices in comparison to agricultural water users, threatening an impact on crop production and yield if farmers are priced out of the market.

The stress on water resources is already considerable. Within the US, 18% of harvested cropland is irrigated (pdf), most of which is attributed to corn, soy, wheat and hay, but also includes water-intensive crops such as sugar beets, sugar cane, rice and cotton. Some 412 irrigation-intensive US counties are currently facing moderate to high levels of water stress – around 23% of total US land area.

...approximately one-third of publicly traded US electric utilities derive more than 10% of their electric power generation from already water stressed regions. One in every four publicly traded US electric utilities operate in counties that are both water stressed and irrigation intensive.

In the US, if the situation remains as it is today, the competition for water resources may reach a tipping point that results in stranded assets, reduced productivity, and increased tensions between farmers and industry. In the medium term, policymakers may need to dictate water allocation priorities.

Of course 1.2-billion dollars worth of foodstuffs is really small potatoes but it's a problem that could grow massively as America's aquifers are being drained, wells running dry even as sustained drought continues in America's agricultural belt.

I know!  Why don't they just frack for water?  Oh, I get it, never mind. 

Alberta - Yet Again, Number One!

It seems that Alberta has claimed another world record.  This time it's for the magnitude of a fracking-induced earthquake, a 4.4-magnitude temblor last week at Fox Creek.

"The location of the earthquake is consistent with being induced by hydraulic fracturing operations," confirmed Peter Murchland, a spokesman for the Alberta Energy Regulator.

"The AER regards all changes in seismicity that have the potential to indicate an increased risk associated with hydrocarbon production seriously," Murchland added.

...For years industry and fracking experts argued the technology wouldn't cause quakes that could be felt on the surface.

But specialists in earthquake hazards such as Gail Atkinson, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Induced Seismicity Hazards at Ontario's Western University, argued the opposite.

"I have consistently maintained this kind of thing can happen," said Atkinson. "With fracking, the magnitudes have been increasing every year."

Natural Resources Canada reported a swarm of at least 15 earthquakes this January west of Fox Creek in a region where Encana, Talisman, Apache, Chevron Canada and ExxonMobile intensified the drilling and fracking of two-kilometre-long horizontal wells nearly a year ago.

These fracked earthquakes may also impact on the feasibility of underground carbon sequestration.  The fossil fuelers regularly promise to capture CO2 emitted from extraction and processing that will then be liquefied under intense pressure and pumped underground.  That CO2, if it leaks to the surface, is deadly and all it might take is a failed well cap or seismic rift to allow that to happen.

Range Wars, 21st Century-Style

It's a classic theme of the 'wild west' - range wars where free-range cattle ranchers clashed with farmers whose fenced fields blocked their way.  Today it's a struggle between farmers and frackers and this time the struggle is over water, more specifically who gets it and who goes without.

This has been going on in Texas for some time and, generally, it's the frackers who win.  Now the same thing has flared up in drought-stricken California, especially in the rich agricultural area of the Monterey Basin beneath which lies an awful lot of fossil fuel just waiting to be fracked.

Despite several polls indicating that a majority of California residents are opposed to the “water-intensive extreme oil and gas extraction process” known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the state’s Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown has continued to pledge his support for pro-fracking legislation.

 

As Brown gets closer to signing a piece of legislation that would allow for the expansion of fracking and other controversial forms of oil extraction in California’s Monterey Shale formation, located beneath California’s “most prized” farmland, opponents have boosted their work to ban fracking in the state.

 

On this one, Jerry Brown is dead wrong.  Those oil and gas reserves have been securely sequestered underground for millions of years.  They're not going anywhere.  They'll still be right where they sit when the drought ends.  It's the farmers who have long contributed to California's prosperity that are at mortal risk if they're not given priority access over frackers to the limited water supply.

Will this Setback the Future of Altnerative Energy in the U.S.?

Drill, baby, drill.   We've heard of America's natural gas bounty realized by extensive fracking.   Overlooked, however, is the success of fracking in U.S. oil production.   The Associated Press reports the United States may soon become the world's top oil producer.

U.S. oil output is surging so fast that the United States could soon overtake Saudi Arabia as the world's biggest producer.

Driven by high prices and new drilling methods, U.S. production of crude and other liquid hydrocarbons is on track to rise 7 percent this year to an average of 10.9 million barrels per day. This will be the fourth straight year of crude increases and the biggest single-year gain since 1951.

The boom has surprised even the experts.

...The United States will still need to import lots of oil in the years ahead. Americans use 18.7 million barrels per day. But thanks to the growth in domestic production and the improving fuel efficiency of the nation's cars and trucks, imports could fall by half by the end of the decade.

...The major factor driving domestic production higher is a newfound ability to squeeze oil out of rock once thought too difficult and expensive to tap. Drillers have learned to drill horizontally into long, thin seams of shale and other rock that holds oil, instead of searching for rare underground pools of hydrocarbons that have accumulated over millions of years.

Two things seem likely from America's petroleum bonanza.   With a declining dependence on imported oil there'll be less pressure on American governments to move toward alternative energy.   And that same declining dependence on imported oil will (probably already has) sent alarm bells ringing from the Prime Minister's Office to the Alberta legislature, increase pressure to push the Northern Gateway through and up the chances of a showdown between Ottawa and British Columbia.