Flaring

A North Dakota exploration and production (E&P) task force on Wednesday outlined plans to slash the amounts of associated, or flared, natural gas over the next six years to as little as 10% from the current levels of more than 30%.

Wyoming hopes to complete most of the steps needed to formally change its rules related to flaring of gas associated with its booming oil production, Grant Black, supervisor of the state Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (OGCC), told NGI on Thursday. It is part of a larger review of the OGCC rules.

A group of small natural gas-related firms seeking to displace diesel use in North Dakota’s Bakken Shale oilfield operations and transportation have launched an effort to gauge the interest of operators in switching to compressed (CNG) or liquefied natural gas (LNG) applications.

North Dakota’s swelling revenues from robust shale-driven production should get richer based on an announcement Tuesday by Tulsa-based Oneok Partners LP to invest $650-780 million by 2016 for new natural gas infrastructure, spending that could relieve a chronic flared gas problem.

Natural gas infrastructure in the Bakken Shale is being added at the fastest rate ever, but associated gas flaring at the wellhead stubbornly remains due to a complex set of challenges, according to a report released Wednesday by the North Dakota Pipeline Authority.

With crude oil production and natural gas flaring on a record-setting pace in the Bakken Shale, North Dakota and industry officials welcomed a new gas pipeline link, but pipelines are only part of the problem.

Wyoming Gov. Matt Meadhas namedBridget Hillas director of theOffice of State Lands and Investments, which is involved in, among other things, associated wellhead natural gas flaring and coalbed methane leases (seeDaily GPI,June 20, 2012). Hill, who was an attorney for the lands office for six years, replacesRyan Lance, who is moving to the private sector. The office supports the state’s Board of Land Commissioners and the Loan and Investment Board, which are composed of the top five elected officials, including Mead.

A small increase in natural gas flaring worldwide was detected in 2011, the most recent year for which statistics are compiled, and that increase concerns officials at a World Bank-led global partnership focused on the oilfield issue.

Wyoming and North Dakota are stepping up statewide assessments of ways to cut down on the volumes of associated natural gas flaring at oil wellhead sites, but the economics for oil/gas operators in some cases are complicating the efforts.