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Assessment of Volatile Organic Compound and Hazardous Air Pollutant Emissions from Oil and Natural Gas Well Pads using Mobile Remote and On-site Direct Measurements
Citation:
Brantley, H., E. Thoma, AND A. Eisele. Assessment of Volatile Organic Compound and Hazardous Air Pollutant Emissions from Oil and Natural Gas Well Pads using Mobile Remote and On-site Direct Measurements. JOURNAL OF THE AIR & WASTE MANAGEMENT ASSOCIATION. Air & Waste Management Association, Pittsburgh, PA, 65(9):1072-82, (2015).
Impact/Purpose:
Summary of direct and remote well pad VOC emission studies including two new results from EPA field work.
Description:
Emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOC) and hazardous air pollutants (HAP) from oil and natural gas production were investigated using direct measurements of component-level emissions on well pads in the Denver-Julesburg (DJ) Basin and remote measurements of production pad-level emissions in the Barnett, DJ, and Pinedale basins. Results from this onsite direct-measurement study indicate that emissions from condensate storage tanks are highly variable and can be a measureable source of VOCs and HAPs, even when control measures are in place.Comparison of the measured condensate tank emissions with potentially emitted concentrations modeled using E&P TANKS model suggested that some of the tanks were effectively controlled (emissions less than 95% of potential) while others were not. Results also indicate that the use of a commercial high volume sampler (HVS) without corresponding canister measurements may result in severe underestimates of emissions from condensate tanks. Instantaneous VOC and HAP emissions measured onsite on controlled systems in the DJ were best approximated by a log-normal distribution with geometric means and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of 0.19 (0.09, 0.35) g VOC/s and 0.005 (0.002, 0.01) g HAP/s. The results were significantly higher than VOC emissions results from the study conducted by ERG for the City of Fort Worth using the same method in the Barnett (0.000 (0.000, 0.001) g VOC/s and 0.00 (0.000, 0.000) g HAP/s) on pads with low or no condensate production. The VOC emissions results were significantly lower than some but not all estimates of uncontrolled emissions from condensate tanks in Texas measured by routing all emissions through a single port monitored by a flow measurement device for extended time periods. VOC and HAP concentrations measured remotely using EPA Other Test Method (OTM) 33A in the DJ were not significantly different from the onsite measurements.
