Mysteries of Methane Leak in Florida and Not-So-Clean Fossil Fuels

There’s a BIG NatGas leak (Methane) in Florida. The source of which is not being owned up to. There’s no oil/gas drilling in the area. And, until about a year ago, most such leaks might go totally unnoticed. Read the Bloomberg article No One is Owning Up to Releasing Cloud of Methane in Florida.

Oil Flaring at Night in North America (Bakken)

First Methane. The largest component of natural gas (NatGas) is methane (EIA). Various oil formations of fossil fuels are oil, mostly gas, or a combination. Even in coal formations there is methane, which has made coal mining especially dangerous for explosions and fires.

When you see the flame stacks burning above oil wells and refineries, this is natural gas being flared off. Flaring is far preferred then just releasing it, venting, because methane is a wicked greenhouse gas (GHG) at 82 times the global warming capacity as CO2 in the first 20 years (about 30 times as potent over 100 years).

Oh Frack... Ain't no such thang clean oil n gas!

You've heard that there ain't no such thing as "Clean" Coal. Maybe scrubbing some of the sulpher and removing some of the heavly metals. But certainly not clean. And then there's the dirty little secret of Coal Ash!.

But this article sums up the current research related to fracking. Ouch. Evidense keeps mounting about the down-side of oil fracking. This article really sums it up. 

Link to the Ecologist article on Fracking.

Of course, our argument here at SustainZine, is focused around the sustainability nature of fossil fuels in general. It's okay, kinda, to use fossil fuels, but only do so when you have a long term plan that is sustainable, and this is the bridge to the future.

FPL gets approval to charge customers for fracking investment... The Real Story.

FPL gets approval to charge customers for fracking investment | Tampa Bay Times:

I was astounded to here that FPL is getting into the Fracking business. There's this baloney about trying to save some money for their investors. FPL Customers pay, in advance, to drill Nat Gas wells in Alabama, and then reap some of the benefits of the wells, if any, in the form of low NatGas prices in the future.

It sounds too good to be true. And leaves you shaking your head as to why a publicly regulated power utility would wonder off the path into the woods looking for firewood and NatGas.

So the Fla PSC rubber stamped the deal. As they always do. (Although the PSC turned down a petition to pay for Federal Lobbying, an obvious red herring in the mix.)

Comes to find out that NextEra, the parent company of FPL, already has oil drilling interests... 

There are many reasons why a power company might want to get into the drilling business, but the one given seems like the very last on the list.

Water, maybe. Fracking takes huge amount of water, as does power generation.

Pipe lines. Power companies already have massive right-of-ways related to power lines. This seems like a perfect fit: run power through the line and gas through the ground.

The one I like best would be to capture the NatGas that is flared in oilfields, produce power and send the power off to the grid through wire. We currently flare half of all NatGas produced in the USA. Nobody really wants to talk about it, but probably more than half. (Better to flare it, then release the methane, but still a very ugly and wasteful business).

Here seems to be the answer: Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) through pipelines to markets, domestic and abroad. We in the US pay only bout 1/3 of what the rest of the world pays for NatGas. At about $3.50 per unit for us, and maybe $10-$12 for most other countries. Liquidification and shipping LNG is in the works on many fronts. Cheniere Energy, Inc.
(trading symbol LNG) is coming on board with export terminals with a vengeance. 

Imagine what it will look like when our mountains of NatGas start to look like mountains of dollars.

So what does this mean in the next era of power utilities? I don't really know. It should take some time to understand the maze and the interlinking parts. 

Here is discussion about Spectra Energy (drilling and such) and FPL and the pipeline in existence and/or planned. LAKE.org article. There's a pipeline through the Gulf...

So very interesting.

And, of course, it has to be mentioned: NatGas is far better than that other major fuel (not mentioning any names, like Coal), but it is still not a renewable resources. Non-sustainable, by any other name, is still a broken business model... It's just a mater of time.

'via Blog this'

A Shrinking U.S. Trade Deficit—Brought to You by Fracking - Businessweek

A Shrinking U.S. Trade Deficit—Brought to You by Fracking - Businessweek:

US trade deficit is shrinking. Rapidly.

The reason is the import of oil is a very expensive commodity. By the end of this decade, North America should be trade neutral on energy and then move to a surplus thereafter. At peak, the US trade deficit was about 6% of GDP. That is, our GDP would be reduced by the oil that is not produced domestically, but produced afar.

For a country such as Saudi Arabia, with only about $30 to $40 costs associated with producing a barrel of oil, that leaves about $60 of profits. All of that money per barrel leaves the US and goes to foreign governments and foreign companies (or Multi-national companies).

With all the new found oil at home, the GDP jumps by a couple percent. The trade deficit -- as it pertains to energy -- will shift form a percent or two deficit to  becoming a surplus within 10 years.

Economically, this is a beautiful think. If the US were a developing country this would be called economic development utilizing import substitution. Here is a blog on US Energy  that discusses the US Energy Outlook Report for 2013. Want to look at forecasts of the future, go to US Energy Information Administration Annual Energy Outlook 2013.

As we drop from 10M barrels per day of oil-type imports to zero we will drop more than $300B in trade deficits (more than 2% of GDP). (See http://www.eia.gov/.)

National security improves.

Of course there is one small caveat. Oil, gas, coal and Nat Gas are non-renewable resources. That means that they must be phased out, sooner or later.

Beautiful thing economically, but with a few clouds surrounding it.

'via Blog this'

Study: Natural gas industry can cut fracking emissions

Study: Natural gas industry can cut fracking emissions:

This would be great to minimize the methane from the fracking of wells.

Since NatGas is soooo much cleaner than coal (and gasoline). It is a slam-dunk decision as a way to start moving away from coal.

Of course, it is not a sustainable solution for the looong term. NatGas could be a bridge fuel to a clean and renewable future.

'via Blog this'

Fracking is unearthing surprise bacteria | Health, Medical, and Science Updates

Fracking is unearthing surprise bacteria | Health, Medical, and Science Updates:

Hmmm....

I'm not sure that many of us have been thinking about this? What is living in the oil and gas before we extract it from the wells?

This study starts to bring that to the (fore)ground. It is interesting that some of these guys do better, much better, related to the fracking process and/or being brought to the surface.

Hmmm... And I always thought the the main risks from fracking were: water contamination and possibly the increased chance for earthquakes.?


'via Blog this'