Meetings with Other State Agencies
Meetings with Other State Agencies
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| Meetings with Other State Agencies |
(CDPH) and the California Department of Conservation (CDOC) in July, 2013. In
August, 2013, he held separate meetings with officials in Texas (representing the Texas
Department of State Health Services (TDSHS), the Texas Railroad Commission (TRC),
and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ)) and officials in Illinois
(representing the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) and the Illinois Department
of Natural Resources (IDNR)). The purpose of these meetings was to learn directly from
the state agencies about each state’s experience with oil and gas development and to
evaluate how the oil and gas regulatory programs in those states compare to the
regulatory program in New York State. The following summarizes the findings of these
meetings at the time they occurred in 2013.
California
Like New York, California has a long history of oil and gas development. As is currently
the case in New York, essentially all oil and gas wells in California are vertical wells.
Most oil wells in California are stimulated using low-volume hydraulic fracturing. The
geology in areas currently being developed in California is very different from the
Marcellus Shale formation in New York. Most current activity in California produces oil
from tight sand formations. These formations also produce a large quantity of formation
water (brine), which is re-used for hydraulic fracturing and for enhanced oil recovery. A
small fraction of the produced brine is treated and can be used for agricultural irrigation.
The formations currently being drilled in California have very little naturally-occurring
radioactive material (NORM). The Monterey Shale in California is a shale formation
somewhat analogous to the Marcellus Shale, although the Monterey is expected to
produce primarily oil. Exploitation of the Monterey Shale would require horizontal drilling
and high-volume hydraulic fracturing, but activity in this formation on a commercial scale
has so far not taken place because of technical challenges due to the unusual chemical
and physical properties of the formation.
Unlike New York, where low-volume hydraulic fracturing has been specifically regulated
under the Generic Environmental Impact Statement since 1992, California does not
currently have formal regulations specific to hydraulic fracturing. A discussion draft of
proposed hydraulic fracturing regulations was released by CDOC for public review and
comment in December, 2012. Public feedback was obtained on the discussion draft in a
series of public hearings, and a formal proposed rule is expected to be released soon.
The discussion draft indicates that all records submitted under the rules would be
considered public records for the purposes of the state’s public records law. The
discussion draft includes provisions that would require well operators to publicly
disclose all information about chemical additives and carrier fluids used in hydraulic
fracturing fluids for a well. This requirement would be subject to exceptions for
information claimed to be trade secrets.
California does not currently conduct public health surveillance monitoring related
specifically to oil and gas development. As is the case in New York State, CDPH
monitors water quality for public drinking water supplies as a routine part of its drinking
water regulatory program. CDPH has reviewed 250 million individual sampling results
from its regulatory water monitoring program. Nine drinking water wells were found to
have had detections of chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing. Of those, only two wells
had an oil or gas well nearby and further investigation suggested the contaminants were
most likely related to other sources.
Texas
Texas also has a long history as a major oil and gas producer in the U.S. In 2011,
Texas produced the largest quantities of oil and natural gas of any state. Hydraulic
fracturing has been used in the state for about 60 years. Starting in 2004, Texas’
Barnett Shale formation was one of the first locations in the United States where high
volume hydraulic fracturing and directional drilling were used on a commercial scale to
develop an unconventional shale formation. The Barnett Shale is a shale formation
underlying areas of north Texas including the City of Fort Worth and surrounding
suburban and rural counties that is geologically somewhat similar to the Marcellus
Shale. Other areas of significant oil and gas development in unconventional shale
formations in the state include the Eagle Ford Shale in south Texas and the
Haynesville-Bossier shale in east Texas. The Cline Shale in west Texas is now also
attracting commercial attention for potential oil production.
Oil and gas development in Texas is regulated by the TRC. Operators are required to
comply with all TRC rules, which cover all aspects of well development, such as well
construction, casing and cementing, drilling operations and flaring. Operators are
required to document their compliance in well completion forms. Well cementers are
licensed in Texas, and well operators are required to employ licensed cementers. Unlike
New York regulations, the TRC rules do not include specific separation distances from
resources such as surface water. Hydraulic fracturing chemical additive information is
required to be submitted to fracfocus.org (a publicly-available online database), with the
exception of additive information claimed as trade secrets. The TRC can require
operators to provide trade secret information to the agency if needed to respond to
emergency situations. There are essentially no oil and gas wastewater discharges in
Texas. Most oil and gas wastewater is disposed of in Class II underground injection
disposal wells. Some wastewater recycling for use in hydraulic fracturing is now being
done. The TCEQ issues permits for air pollutant emissions from oil and gas facilities,
and also conducts routine air monitoring and enforcement monitoring. TCEQ has a
large network of fixed air monitoring stations for volatile organic chemicals, including
monitoring sites located near Barnett Shale wells. TCEQ also uses hand-held and
aircraft-mounted infra-red cameras for compliance and enforcement monitoring of oil
and gas facilities such as pipelines, tanks, and compressors. The cameras obtain direct
evidence of leaks or fugitive emissions of volatile chemicals from equipment and are
considered an important enforcement tool by TCEQ staff.
The TDSHS does not have a health surveillance program specific to oil and gas
development, but does maintain several general public health surveillance programs
similar to those in New York such as infectious-disease reporting, birth defects registry,
cancer registry, and trauma registry. TDSHS has noted boomtown problems in some
rural parts of the state with rapid increases in oil and gas development. In particular,
increased incidence of sexually-transmitted diseases has been observed. Also, acute
housing shortages, including shortages of hotel rooms in remote locations, have been
observed to result in challenges for regulatory agencies visiting these areas and for
social services agencies attempting to place clients in temporary housing. Commonly
reported local concerns related to oil and gas development include noise, odors, and
impacts from truck traffic.
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