Air Pollution Found at Five Natural-Gas Sites in North Texas

Five natural-gas sites in Fort Worth, Texas, last year produced air pollution that exceeded state regulations, according to a study on the effects of drilling and production in the city.

Eastern Research Group Inc., a consultant hired by the Fort Worth City Council, also found visible emissions at 296 of 388 gas well sites it examined. The study was posted on the city’s website today.

The city requested the study in response to resident concerns that gas drilling, fracturing, compression and collection in the area’s Barnett Shale gas field may have an adverse effect on air quality.

The study may have implications in other onshore fields, such as the Marcellus Shale inPennsylvania and New York, the Haynesville Shale in Louisiana and the Fayetteville Shale in Arkansas, Jason Lamers, a city spokesman, said in an interview. It’s the first study to test for emissions during all phases of gas development, including drilling, hydraulic fracturing, well completion, pipeline operations and compression, Lamers said.

Source: Bloomberg

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Highway Department Pulls Back on Weight Limits

Same song, second verse. The gas drilling industry simply will not abide being made to pay for the damage it does to Arkansas. The Highway and Transportation Department, no slouch in the political lobbying department, has been shouted down by the yowls of the industry in attempting to reduce weight limits on secondary roads in the Fayetteville shale exploration zone. (I should have mentioned that the gas drillers pulled in allies from the timber and agriculture sector because the weight limits could have affected them, too, though it's the new intense use by the gas industry that's accelerated road problems.)

The plans to reduce weight limits — and better preserve the roads from drilling rig damage — have been cut almost in half — on 69 rather than 133 miles of roads. And the 133 recommended had been edited down from some 300 miles of roads originally considered for lower limits by highway engineers.

Full details follow. Remember this when you're asked to approve a diesel tax and sales tax increase to pay for road work, some of it caused by people who won't pay their own way. The Highway Department seems to be falling back to a beg-them-for-alms approach.

Source: Arkansas Times

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