State Gas Fracking Groups React To Forthcoming Federal Regs

The fracking debate may soon include new regulations from the federal government, with U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar saying that proposals may emerge in about a month to regulate how the natural gas industry operates on federal lands.

“This will have a big impact on Arkansas … because we certainly have a fair amount of federal land in Arkansas,” said Kelly Robbins, executive vice president of the Arkansas Independent Producers & Royalty Owners (AIPRO).

In this story at Natural Gas for America, Salazar said proposed rules would address many aspects of natural gas exploration, drilling and production. Rules will include disclosure of chemicals injected underground, and other rules to protect groundwater.

Salazar said the government and industry must work toward “transparency and full disclosure” as they tap the country’s supply of abundant natural gas.

“I think hydraulic fracking is very much a necessary part of the future of natural gas,” Salazar said. “I think hydraulic fracking can be done in a safe way, in an environmentally responsible way, and in a way that doesn’t create all the concerns that it is creating across the country right now.”

To improve production of a well, a well service company will force a frac fluid under high pressure into underground formations around the well bore. The proppants, suspended in the frac fluid, are forced into the underground fractures and “prop” them open after the frac fluid is removed. Modern techniques and compounds have been used in recent years to make it economically feasible to extract natural gas from a wider range of geologic structures.

Hydraulic fracturing and other drilling techniques have become a source of controversy in the Fayetteville Shale and other unconventional shale plays. Some central Arkansas landowners and environmentalists have complained that the water and fluids used in the fracturing process is a danger to groundwater and could contaminate underground sources of drinking water.

Others have claimed the fracturing process and drilling of wells to depths of more than 10,000 feet is the major reason for the increased number of earthquakes in Arkansas. The Arkansas Geological Society has said it could not tie earthquakes to natural gas drilling, but would further investigate wastewater injection in the shale as a possibility.

Sam Lane, director of Stop Arkansas Fracking, said there is no such thing as safe fracking.

“It depends of course on what kind of regulations they come out with. But there are so many individual problems affecting people in so many different ways, it’s hard to see how it could ever be safe,” Lane said when asked about Salazar’s push for safe fracking rules.

Lane argues that chemicals used in fracking may be safe in small doses and when not interacting with other chemicals, but studies have yet to show if the chemicals are safe when used in large amounts during the fracking process.

“I know the industry is saying they use safe chemicals or even chemicals that are in your cereal, but they are pumping thousands and thousands of gallons of those chemicals in the ground, and nobody knows how those chemicals will interact under the ground or with the other chemicals,” Lane said.

Robbins disagrees with Lane, saying 99.5% of the fracking solution is “just water and sand.” He also said that despite all the claims of harm, “there’s been no evidence of ground water contamination” from fracking.

Robbins also said Arkansas has been a leader in the country with respect to putting rules in place requiring natural gas producers to disclose the chemicals they use.

The Arkansas Oil & Gas Commission now requires natural gas companies to register chemicals used in the fracking process. Some environmental groups applauded the agency’s disclosure effort, but called for more transparency in the process by not allowing for exemptions for trade secrets.

State officials also have strengthened cement casing regulations that require drillers to seal wells. Robbins said the state soon will set decibel level limits on wells and production areas near occupied dwellings.

“Arkansas is leading the way on this (natural gas regs), and it’s something we are very proud of,” Robbins said.

Later this year an independent group will review Arkansas’ rules related to the natural gas industry, according to Robbins. STRONGER, an acronym for State Review of Oil and Natural Gas Environmental Regulations, was formed in 1999 to continue to update rules and regulations begun cooperatively in 1988 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission (IOGCC).

“They will have some interesting input for us … and they, I think, will be impressed with some of the things we already are doing on this front,” Robbins said.

Michael Tilley with our content partner, The City Wire, is the author of this report. He can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].