Texas Senate Approves Fracking Disclosure Bill

joesmalls · Jun 1, 2011

http://www.texastribune.org/texas-energy/energy/texas-senate-approves-fracking-disclosure-bill/

After a lengthy discussion, the Texas Senate unanimously passed a bill Wednesday that would require drilling companies using hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," techniques to disclose on a public website the chemicals they use in the process.

The bill is "going to be landmark legislation on the hydraulic fracturing nationwide," said Sen. Troy Fraser, R-Horseshoe Bay and chairman of the Natural Resources Committee.

Texas produces more natural gas than any other state in the nation.

The House has already passed similar legislation, although the Senate bill includes a giant amendment that would change the name and structure of the Railroad Commission, the state oil and gas regulator. This means it could be more difficult to reconcile the House and Senate versions of the fracking disclosure bill in conference committee, which is the next step in the process.

An amendment to the bill brought by Sen. Glenn Hegar, R-Katy, would have delayed implementation of the disclosure requirement for six to 12 months, but it was voted down. Disclosure will be required starting in January 2012. But the main bill contains provisions that will allow companies like Halliburton that make fracking fluid, which is a mixture of water, sand and chemicals, to keep "trade secrets" off the public website, fracfocus.org.

Three amendments authored by Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, were voted down. They would have required studies of issues like the possibility of using a tracer in fracking fluid to make it potentially easier to sort out any water-contamination allegations.

Fraser and other state lawmakers have said Texas would be the first state to implement such a comprehensive disclosure requirement. It bears noting, however, that Wyoming implemented disclosure requirements for hydraulic fracturing last year, and a few other states, including Arkansas, also have some degree of disclosure requirement. In Wyoming, well-by-well information of what chemicals are in the fracking fluid must be disclosed on a public website, according to Thomas Doll, an official with Wyoming's Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. Wyoming also has provisions to protect trade secrets.

However, Texas may be the first to do this in statute — and it would take further analysis to determine which requirement is more comprehensive, Wyoming or Texas.

"I really believe this [bill] is going to be a template for the entire nation," said Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, the original sponsor in the Senate.
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It's a good start although I don't understand why provisions need to be added to protect certain companies.

jackdog · Jun 1, 2011

a lot of companies are already doing this voluntarily. If you are interested in any areas being developed near you go to Fracfocus.org . They list fracking sites state by state along with each states regulations as well as the chemicals the wells near you are using.

waltky · Jun 19, 2011

Frackin' fracking...

Water is the new liquid gold in Texas
6/18/2011 - Oil companies that need water for "fracking" wells compete for access

Bruce Frasier sweats in the 106-degree heat at his Carrizo Springs, Texas, farm while stacking 42-pound boxes of cantaloupes bound for Kroger supermarkets and Wal-Mart Stores. But he's turning away all offers for his most prized commodity: water. Texas's worst drought since record-keeping began in 1895 is fueling a rally in water prices as energy prospectors from ExxonMobil to Korea National Oil expand the use of a drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, that uses up to 13 million gallons in a single well.

Frasier, whose Dixondale Farms is the state's largest cantaloupe grower, has been offered as much as 70 cents per 42-gallon barrel of water he pumps from an aquifer beneath his land. That same water fetched no price at all as recently as three years ago, before oil exploration boomed in Texas's Eagle Ford Shale rock formation. So far, Frasier is standing firm. "I've got to have that water for my farming operation," he explains.

With the region having received less than 2 inches of rainfall since Oct. 1, oil producers are buying water from anyone willing to sell. "It's pretty dry down here and a lot of oil companies are looking for water," says Robert Mace, a deputy executive administrator at the Texas Water Development Board. The water crisis in Texas, the biggest oil- and gas-producing state in the United States, highlights a continuing debate in North America and Europe over fracking's impact on water supplies. Environmentalists say the method poses a contamination threat, while farmers face growing competition for scarce water.

Fracking is a 60-year-old method of shattering rocks to unleash oil and natural gas with high-pressure jets of sand- and chemical-infused water. In the past decade, the technique has been refined and coupled with new ways of drilling sideways through oil-rich shale formations, spurring an onshore exploration boom, says Robert Ineson, senior director of global gas at researcher IHS CERA.

More http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43443146/ns/business-us_business/
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Margot · Jun 19, 2011

waltky said: ↑

Frackin' fracking...

Water is the new liquid gold in Texas
6/18/2011 - Oil companies that need water for "fracking" wells compete for access
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Good information...

Margot · Jun 19, 2011

Fracking sure uses a lot of water.

Fracking is a 60-year-old method of shattering rocks to unleash oil and natural gas with high-pressure jets of sand- and chemical-infused water. In the past decade, the technique has been refined and coupled with new ways of drilling sideways through oil-rich shale formations, spurring an onshore exploration boom, says Robert Ineson, senior director of global gas at researcher IHS CERA.

More http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43443146...s-us_business/

Dr Vinegar in Israel is experimenting with putting heaters underground for 3 years..

Now you know what SCAM is all about.

jackdog · Jun 19, 2011

Margot said: ↑

Fracking sure uses a lot of water.

.
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free enterprise is a wonderful thing isn't it?

General Electric Co. is launching a mobile device aimed at helping natural gas drillers recycle water used in a controversial gas drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing. The truck-sized, transportable device would cut down on both the amount of fresh water used and wastewater currently trucked long distances for disposal.

The company's mobile evaporator would allow natural gas producers to reuse some of the millions of gallons of water used to extract natural gas from dense shale deposits deep underground through the so-called "fracking" process. Water is mixed with chemicals and sand and pumped at high pressure thousands of feet below the surface to create fissures in the rock and release the gas.

Fracking uses a large amount of fresh water and produces billions of gallons of wastewater annually, GE said. The company says its mobile evaporator will cut the volume of wastewater and fresh water needed by between 50 percent and 90 percent by recycling water directly at the well site. That will also lower producers' transportation and disposal costs.
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9IIGIKO0.htm?campaign_id=msnbc
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Margot · Jun 19, 2011

jackdog said: ↑

free enterprise is a wonderful thing isn't it?
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While Texas is suffering a severe drought and loss of crops.

waltky · Jul 26, 2011

Mebbe we could frack our way outta national debt with natural gas...

Report: World Gains From US Natural Gas Abundance
July 26, 2011 - The development of new drilling operations in shale rock has led to a dramatic increase in U.S. natural gas reserves. While there are some environmental concerns about the practice of fracturing rock deep underground to release gas, drilling operations have expanded from Texas to Pennsylvania, keeping gas prices low as demand increases. A new study says the U.S. natural gas boom also may help ease energy problems in other parts of the world.

Just five or six years ago, U.S. demand for natural gas was outpacing supply and countries with large reserves were developing plans to use special container ships to export gas to the United States. Russia's Gazprom was planning to bring liquified natural gas to ports on the U.S. east coast, and Qatar had similar plans for a terminal on the Texas Gulf of Mexico coast.

Domestic production surges

But a report from the James Baker Institute at Rice University in Houston, called Shale Gas and U.S. National Security, indicates the United States no longer needs to bring gas from far away. The Baker Institute's Ken Medlock, who along with Amy Myers Jaffe and Peter Hartley, authored the report, spoke to VOA by phone. There was just a really strong push to bring liquified natural gas to the United States, and so what basically has happened with growth in domestic production is that all that expectation has been turned upside down, said Medlock.

Easing global demand

Medlock said this not only helps the U.S. economy and expands the job market in the energy sector, it also helps other countries in need of natural gas through what economists call displacement. The gas that would have been shipped to the United States, he said, can now go elsewhere on the world market. By displacement, what we have done in this country is push LNG [Liquefied Natural Gas] so that it can actually find a home in Europe and Asia.

This effect has been especially important for Europe, where reliance on natural gas from Russia had become a strategic liability. In 2006, Russia cut off gas delivery to Ukraine over a price hike dispute, and many neighboring countries that once were under the dominance of the Soviet Union, notably Poland, have been seeking ways of developing their own shale gas. Some have come to Texas to learn more about U.S. drilling operations.

Possible natural-gas boom
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waltky · Jan 9, 2012

Critical year in the debate over fracking safety...

Its year for fracking to break up or break through
Sunday, January 8, 2012 - The natural gas industry and its opponents are readying their final arguments for what many think will be a critical year in the debate over fracking safety.

Supporters of the hydraulic fracturing process - the use of water, sand and chemicals to break underground rock and release huge amounts of gas - boast of recent economic growth, with hundreds of thousands of jobs created in the past several years and small, sleepy communities in Pennsylvania, North Dakota and elsewhere transformed into boomtowns. Skeptics point to reports of suspected water contamination and links to earthquakes that some consider too high a price to pay.

Both sides of the debate eagerly await an Environmental Protection Agency report due out later this year that observers generally expect to call for harsh crackdowns and new federal regulations on the practice. Whatever the report says, its likely to have a big effect on the attitudes of average Americans and, in the process, affect the future of U.S. energy policy. Its a make-or-break year in the public arena, said Ken von Schaumburg, who served as deputy general counsel at the EPA during the Bush administration. And when you cant beat someone with cold, hard facts, youre going to need public opinion.

Mr. von Schaumburg said he expects the EPA to follow the wishes of the White House and demonize fracking as an unsafe practice that should be, at minimum, heavily regulated and, at most, shut down entirely to focus on development of non-fossil fuels, such as wind and solar power. Its based on a predetermination. Thats what they want it to say, he said of the report. The EPA already has fired its opening shot.

Last month, the agency released a report that blamed fracking for water contamination in the small town of Pavillion, Wyo. The industry has denied those charges, and an independent third-party review is expected to begin soon. Water pollution used to be the most common concern cited by fracking critics, but another potential danger tied to the practice in the past nine months is the risk of earthquakes. Ohio has experienced at least 11 tremors since March linked to the disposal of wastewater created during fracking. State officials have shut down all disposal wells in the area while investigations continue.

The quakes have given more ammunition to opponents, who sense an opportunity this year to crush the fracking practice for good. I think 2012 is a critical year for us to decide as a country what direction we want to go. Natural gas might be a clean energy source, but right now were seeing a lot of evidence of pollution, said Levana Layendecker, a spokeswoman for Democracy for America, the liberal political action committee founded by former Vermont governor and one-time presidential hopeful Howard Dean. The organization has become one of the most vocal critics of the industry and operates the website stopfrackingnow.com.

MORE
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conBgone · Jan 9, 2012

Texas, typical. But as described, the water issue will kill this unhealthy fracking tech issue nationwide.

HB Surfer · Jan 9, 2012

Even the Obama Administrations own EPA study on Fracking made the claim that it was very safe and really doesn't endanger the water tables.

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Texas Senate Approves Fracking Disclosure Bill

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Texas Senate Approves Fracking Disclosure Bill

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