The Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association (APPEA) shared this informative graphic that shows how much land is required to produce enough energy to power 8,000 homes for a year.
It takes just one natural gas well covering 0.02 hectares (0.05 acres) to power 8,000 homes for a year. In...
The energy industry is substantially reducing methane emissions from natural gas and oil production and is expected to continue reducing emissions, says an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) report released September 30, 2014.
According to the EPA, reported methane emissions from the petroleum and natural gas systems sector have...
Natural gas vehicles are cost efficient and boast low emissions, and it seems that Texas has caught on. Sales of natural gas as a motor fuel are surging in Texas. In October 2013, Texas Railroad Commissioner David Porter launched a natural gas initiative to promote natural gas as a transportation fuel...
It may not be widely known, but the air in the Barnett Shale area of North Texas is the most monitored air in the U.S. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) has installed a system of 15 permanent automated gas chromatograph (AutoGC) stations in the Barnett Shale area that take air samples every hour, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The data is available to the public...
On February 24, 2014, the EPA released its latest Greenhouse Gas Inventory, which shows that methane emissions from natural gas systems have declined significantly in recent years, thanks to new technologies and voluntary efforts by oil...
A new and important study of the air quality in the Barnett Shale was released by Houston-based ToxStrategies, Inc. This study, published in the peer-reviewed “Science of The Total Environment,” is the first large-scale evaluation based on extensive measurements of ambient air in a shale gas producing area. The...
Water disposal at oil and natural gas drilling sites is a costly business. According to a Fort Worth Star-Telegram article, the water and disposal costs for just one well in areas such as the Marcellus Shale or West Texas can reach or surpass $1 million. Due to either dry and arid...
Recently, there has been good news and bad news regarding emissions of carbon dioxide in the United States and the world. The good news is that last year, America’s carbon dioxide emissions fell to their lowest levels since 1994, according to a new Energy Information Administration (EIA) report. Additionally, carbon dioxide emissions...
The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) operates seven continuous air monitors in the Barnett Shale area in North Texas. TCEQ Chairman Bryan Shaw, Ph.D., has said in the past that the number of continuous air monitors, or automatic gas chromatographs, makes the Barnett Shale air the most monitored air in the country. The devices, which are about the size of a small travel trailer...
Do you ever wonder how much water is used to drill and hydraulically fracture natural gas wells in the Barnett Shale? Well, the answer may surprise you because it is, in fact, very little. To answer the question, we asked the largest provider of water in the Barnett Shale area, the Tarrant Regional Water District (TRWD).
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Emissions of carbon dioxide in the U.S. are now lower than they were in the year 2000, and they are expected to continue to decline, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA) in their “Annual Energy Outlook 2012.” Furthermore, the EIA says that carbon dioxide emissions in the electricity-generating sector fell so much in the first three months of 2012 that energy-related CO2...
A new study of methane emissions from unconventional natural gas production was released on June 4, 2012, contradicting the estimates found by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The study, entitled “Characterizing Pivotal Sources of Methane Emissions from Unconventional...
Ever since the Environmental Defense Fund published a paper by Al Armendariz in 2009 alleging that emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from natural gas operations in the Barnett Shale are greater than VOCs from all the cars and trucks in the region, the statement has been repeated over and...
Deposits of oil and natural gas can be found in porous rocks and shale, where saltwater is also found. The handling of the saltwater, or produced water, which brings the oil and gas up to the surface, can be done in different ways.
First of all, in certain situations, some of it can be recycled. Secondly, in the case of conventional reservoirs, it can be returned to the reservoir...
The technology of hydraulic fracturing is responsible for unlocking natural gas that has been hidden away in shale deposits for hundreds of years. However, the hydraulic fracturing process uses water; about 4 to 5 million gallons of water is required to drill and hydraulically fracture one Barnett Shale natural gas well.
While this sounds like a lot of water, it has to be put into...
