Story first appeared in The Wall Street Journal.
The Environmental Protection Agency released long-awaited rules to control air pollution from hydraulic fracturing or "fracking" on Wednesday, marking one of its first efforts to regulate the widely used technique of extracting oil and natural gas.
In releasing the standards, the EPA did offer a concession to oil and natural gas companies by delaying the required use of pollution-control equipment until 2015. Under a proposal unveiled last year, the EPA would have required companies to use the equipment almost immediately.
The industry praised the EPA for giving it more time to comply, but environmental groups said the agency should have been more aggressive with its requirements.
The EPA air chief told reporters Wednesday that a decision to delay compliance was made by agency staff, based on their understanding of the way the industry operated, and was not politically motivated.
Representatives from several energy companies--including ExxonMobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips--met with EPA and White House officials in recent weeks to try to shape the rule.
The EPA's rule, which affects about 13,000 wells drilled each year, coincides with a massive boom in natural gas production that has created opportunities for fuel switching but has also prompted concerns about air pollution and water contamination.
The President has touted natural gas as a valuable domestic resource that can replace coal for electricity generation and supplant oil as a transportation fuel.
The rules announced Wednesday require energy companies to capture smog-forming pollution known as volatile organic compounds when they "frack" a well rather than let it escape into the atmosphere.
Fracking involves the use of a high-pressure mixture of water, sand and chemicals to break apart energy-rich rocks. Toward the end of the process, a combination of fracking fluids and gas rush to the surface and can escape into the atmosphere. It's one of the largest sources of air pollution from the energy industry, the EPA has said.
The EPA's rules don't address aspects of the fracking process that could cause water contamination. The agency is in the process of studying the impact of fracking on water, but said recently that it verified the safety of water in Pennsylvania and would do additional testing on water in Wyoming that it previously said appeared to be affected by local fracking activity.
Under the rules announced Wednesday, oil and gas companies will be forced to use "green completion" technology by 2015. Until then, they will be required to burn off emissions by flaring the natural gas, a common industry practice already used by energy companies to reduce pollution.
Flaring was 95% effective in reducing volatile organic compounds, or VOCs.
The EPA was under a court-ordered deadline to develop the air-quality rules after being sued by environmental groups that had accused the agency of failing to follow the law. The EPA said its rule will improve the air quality in regions where a lot of oil and natural gas drilling occurs.
While the purpose of the EPA's rule is to reduce VOCs, the standards will also cut methane emissions, a potent greenhouse gas. Scientists have recently started to raise questions about the amount of so-called methane leaks from natural gas wells, saying the emissions might make natural gas less friendly to the environment than has been assumed.
In the weeks leading up to Wednesday's announcement, oil and natural gas companies urged EPA and White House officials to delay the green-completion requirements because they said there wasn't enough equipment to go around. Companies would have to line up to use the equipment and stall their production projects until it became available, they said.
Environmental groups said the industry had exaggerated the scarcity of the equipment.
Left to police itself for too long, the oil and gas industry has failed even to adopt pollution controls that pay for themselves.
For more national and worldwide related business news, visit the Peak News Room blog.
For local and Michigan business related news, visit the Michigan Business News
blog.
For healthcare and medical related news, visit the Healthcare and Medical
blog.
For law related news, visit the Nation of Law
blog.
For real estate and home related news, visit the Commercial and Residential Real
Estate blog.
For technology and electronics related news, visit the Electronics America blog.
For organic SEO and web optimization related news, visit the SEO Done Right blog.
