Emissions

Responding to multiple questions from a New York audience Monday on issues surrounding natural gas production, Energy Department Secretary Ernest Moniz said the fuel is both “part of the problem” and “part of the solution,” and it has a strong role to play in underpinning the U.S. economy.

It will be some years before tanker loads of liquefied natural gas (LNG) steam out of U.S. ports, but shale gas is already having an impact on world markets “because of all the LNG the U.S. is not importing,” U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said Monday.

The mining and transport of proppant sand are drawing controversy similar to that related to the content and handling of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) fluids if recent events are an indication.

The governor and air quality regulators in Colorado are seeking broad-based input and support for a new set of air emissions rules applied to oil and natural gas drilling as evidenced by Gov. John Hickenlooper’s move on Monday to assure a smooth regulatory process.

Those wondering about future natural gas burn by power utilities — how much and when — should look to three factors for insight: renewable generation growth, coal-fired plant retirements, and revisions to federal air emissions regulations, analysts at Bernstein Research said in a note.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has updated oil and gas storage tank emission standards it released in April 2012 to allow the phase-in of emission control deadlines and to alleviate confusion over implementation of the requirements.

Concerned groups like the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) are raising new greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions concerns related to the North American natural gas production boom, citing a new paper on methane leakage in Utah’s Uintah Basin released Monday by researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and University of Colorado.

Concerned groups like the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) are raising new greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions concerns related to the North American natural gas production boom, citing a new paper on methane leakage in Utah’s Uintah Basin released Monday by researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and University of Colorado.

A bill to require oil and natural gas companies to meet enhanced water and air emissions standards in order to earn streamlined state environmental permitting was introduced Tuesday by the majority leaders of both houses in the Colorado legislature.