Saturday, November 1, 2014

The Leaking And The Lemon, A Fraccing And LNG Story(Non technical version)



Written by Grant G


Madness becomes intertwined in the fabric of everyday life, spin, promise and the vague are weapons of control, so subtle is the illusion, so numbing is the machine, insanity sold as easily as elixir drawn from the mythical fountain of youth.....

That above paragraph doesn`t sound like the start of another LNG article, but it is...The more one delves into the fracked world of liquefied natural gas the more one comes to the conclusion that the world truly is mad, or gone mad, extracting gas and extracting gas, drill a vertical hole in the ground, find a deposit of gas and presto, gas shoots out of the pipe for years and years, that is indeed a gas deposit, lay a pipe and deliver gas in gas form to business, industry and homes, this is called traditional drilling, old school, deposits were numerous and large, these wells and fields can produce gas for decades, to pipe this gas a few hundred miles, or even a 1000 miles and use domestically is a good use of this energy, and yes those traditional drilled wells do leak fugitive gasses like methane, all wells do..

 http://thetyee.ca/News/2013/01/09/Leaky-Fracked-Wells/

EROI....Remember that, {Energy Return On Investment)..Sheesh, and I called this the non-technical version, where was I...

EROI..Fraccing and LNG export, once you start to consider all the energy required to make that industry function one starts to wonder..to what end, are we actually ahead on the energy, meaning did we expend as much energy to produce LNG for export as it will deliver on the other end of the curve, that being the consumption end in other countries...

Fraccing, drill a vertical hole...slowly turn the drill sideways, reach your target depth, continue to drill horizontally(sideways) for some distance, remove the drill, then pipe, drive, divert from rivers, lakes, streams millions of gallons of water, add special secret sauce to the water and pump it at high pressure kilometers deep in the ground, then drop in a water concussion bomb and set off a underground explosion, thus stunning, sending a high-pressure shockwave through the underground shale formations to extract gas..well golleeeeee Andy, ain`t that special.

It is proven that all gas wells will leak methane and other fugitive gasses into our atmosphere, also what has risen to the surface in recent times is the undeniable fact that fracced wells and fields leak methane gasses but also deplete of their gas holdings quickly, meaning to produce continuous large amounts of feedstock gas for LNG exporters there must and will be a continual flurry of hole drilling, water pumping of millions of gallons and underground explosions..I wonder why mother nature gave us underground shale rock formations, perhaps to keep us lowly humans amused by allowing us to blow up said formations, we do like blowing up things, I remember a show once, forget the name but the two characters used to say.."Theys blow up good, real good"..the show was comedy, or was it a documentary, either way..

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(updated here, 11:55 pm)...I found that blows up real good skit, it was a SCTV ongoing segment featuring the departed and missed John Candy, here`s the video. courtesy Youtube.





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So now we`ll be pumping millions of gallons, no, with LNG we will be pumping billions of gallons of water underground, blowing up shale, leaking methane gasses in our air, piping the gas hundreds of miles to our pristine northern coast, where LNG companies will burn vast volumes of natural gas to freeze the gas into a liquid form, thus blasting our skies with millions of tons of greenhouse gas everyday, year after year, 24/7..365 days a year..we still aren`t there yet, at least not to the end where the consumer buys the gas, now this frozen gas is placed on specialized ocean going tankers, they look like this..








These ocean going vessels give off emissions, lots of emissions, newer LNG carriers actually burn natural gas to operate, oh yea, I almost forgot, if one of these ships exploded, terrorism, malfunction, human error, a collision with an oil laden tar sand goop carrier, the explosive power contained within that one LNG tanker is the equivalent of a Hiroshima bomb..(That was highlighted here, in this article)..

http://powellriverpersuader.blogspot.ca/2013/06/kitimat-and-prince-rupert-in-line-of.html

Yikes to all those port town families, pleasant dreams.

How far does that tanker have to travel across the Pacific ocean to Asia...3000 miles, no, 6000 miles because it returns empty, we still haven`t finished the energy curve, this tanker once in Asia has to visit another LNG plant, a regasification plant where this gas is off-loaded, put in containers where it is warmed up back into gas...warm gas is now piped in and around Asia...Wow, all that energy required to produce energy, was as much energy burned to produce LNG as was delivered, I don`t know, I do know B.C. along with Australia and a few other countries will be world leaders in broken shale rock tourism, and we will have our deep ground not only not thirsty, but saturated with secret proprietary chemicals, nasty little chemicals, a witch`s brew of chemicals pumped in the ground with the water to help ease the exploded shale rock gas out, trying not to be technical here folks, maybe these waters deep underground will migrate and evolve into that treasured and forever sought after fountain of youth water, or perhaps cancers, tumours and multi-headed livestock will be the result, who knows for sure, we don`t even know what chemicals are being placed in the ground, keep the faith people, we can trust energy companies, well..

How much energy was required to produce that Asian product, not sure, can`t calculate, the drilling, the water, the chemicals, broken shale, pipelines, I can simply calculate the energy use at the proposed LNG plants..The Site C dam proposal, Site C if built could power one large LNG plant and about 1/3rd of another LNG plant, Christy Clark has pontificated in her own folksy sorta, "ya know" kinda way that B.C. is going to have 10 LNG plants, or was that 12, who knows at this time, left side, right side of mouth week..

So I was curious as to how many homes, if built could the Site C dam power....and, straight from the BC Hydro web page

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 "Site C would be a source of clean and renewable electricity for over 100 years. Site C would provide 1,100 megawatts of capacity, and produce about 5,100 gigawatt hours of electricity each year – enough energy to power the equivalent of about 450,000 homes per year in B.C."

https://www.bchydro.com/energy-in-bc/projects/site_c/site_c_an_option/what_is_site_c.html

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Clean renewable energy, Christy Clark`s vision, besides blowing up all our shale("Theys blow up good, real good"), her vision would require 10 Site C dams to power her LNG industrial sized wet dream, ...10 Site C dams, enough electricity to power 4, 500,000 homes, ..That would be 4 1/2 million homes, that is more homes than we have people in B.C....B.C. has a mere 4 million people, roughly 1.8 million homes, enough electricity to power up 3 British Columbias will be expended everyday to produce LNG for export..

Now for my non-technical math and energy consumption scale...3 British Columbia`s worth of electrical use, pipelines, holes drilled fast n furious, billions of gallons of water, secret chemicals within(fountain of youth project), poor old busted up and blown up real goood shale rock formations, a floating bomb emission spewing tanker, a trip back n forth over the Pacific Ocean, a stopover at a regasification plant in Asia and another visit to the pipe for our B.C. natural gas..helloooo..hellooo...oops, I was imagining B.C. natural gas shouting that into an empty Asian pipeline, never mind. ....and don`t forget about those criminal(fugitive) methane gasses that aren`t content to stay in their now broken down shale rock abode, skyward they must travel, I hear methane is 10 times, or 100 times more damaging than regular greenhouse gasses, no need to quibble.

Did I mention this plan as advertised will expend/require 1/4 to 1/3 of a trillion dollars, ..the build-out cost, $250 to $300 billion in facilities and pipelines for the advertised dozen LNG plants, add in carrying costs, interest and we are looking at near $1/2 a trillion dollars.......$400,000,000.000.00 in profit needed just to break even, to recoup the investment, and that is before B.C. has received a dime,.... B.C. Government is claiming it will receive near $250 billlion...$650,000,000,000.00.....And the energy companies still haven`t made a profit $1,000,000,000,000.00????..How much gas is that... a lot of gas, a lot of holes, a lot of water, a lot of explosions...

Madness and the illusion converge, skilled labour shortage, the requirement of millions of workers all drilling and blowing up shale rock, intertwined as a control measure, a human control measure, present future prosperity and pacify the non-deliverance of anything tangible, move on to the next scheme, the next fountain of youth, survive your political term, fill your boots and pass the baton to the next snake elixir salesperson,

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it just might be a lemon!



http://thetyee.ca/Books/2013/11/09/Bill-Powers-Natural-Gas-Book/



The Straight Goods

Cheers Eyes Wide Open

21 comments:

Elwood said...

Grant, another good post. Makes people think. That's what LNG is - a smokestack polluter from fracking to pipelines to burning gas for electricity to power LNG with GHGs and huge tanker traffic. All the way from LNG in Campbell River to LNG in Squamish to Kitimat to Prince Rupert.

The Lieberals want to turn BC into another polluting corporate petro state. So much for "Beautiful" BC.

If only we could have our own "CitizensAgainstLNG" here.

http://citizensagainstlng.com/wp/sample-page/

And LNG is gambling with human life. Read this:

"LNG can rapidly vaporize, expand and ignite to burn people and property thousands of yards from the core of the fire. No precaution or risk assessment can guarantee safety in case of an accident, earthquake, tsunami or terrorism."

“A (LNG) Pool fire is intense, burning far more hotly and rapidly than oil or gasoline fires, It cannot be extinguished…..its thermal radiation may injure people and damage property a considerable distance from the fire itself”

CRS Report for Congress, Jan 28, 2004"

“Once ignited, as is very likely when the spill is initiated by a chemical explosion, the floating LNG pool will burn vigorously…Like the attack on the World Trade Center in New York City, there exists no relevant industrial experience with fires of this scale from which to project measures for securing public safety.”

James A. Fay, Professor Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

“If about 3 million gallons of LNG spills onto the water from an LNG tanker ship, flammable vapors from the spill could travel up to 3 miles.”

Dr. Jerry A. Havens, Distinguished Professor, Maurice E Barker Chair in Chemical Process Safety and the Environmental Fate of Chemicals, University of Arkansas

Hugh said...

All that BC natural gas would get burned and end up in the atmosphere. Yet, the govt forces the public sector to buy $18 million in carbon offsets every year so they can say the govt is "carbon neutral".

Now I hear they want to increase US coal exports from Vancouver.

Don't let BC Hydro use its Burrard Thermal gas-power plant. It emits CO2. But govt lets companies take water out of Hydro's Williston Reservoir to use to frack gas.

BC Hydro power is about 95% renewable, carbon-free hydro. Yet it is forced to pay $750,000 a year to buy carbon offsets, money which goes to private companies such as EnCana, which is a gas producer.

http://thetyee.ca/Blogs/TheHook/BC-Politics/2012/02/14/CarbonMoney/

Grant G said...

Thanks Elwood...

Hugh, I admire your determination on the energy file, determination to get the truth out..

Not enough dertimined people in the world..

Hope you two men are breeding.

Cheers

kootcoot said...

"LNG companies will burn vast volumes of natural gas to freeze the gas into a solid form,"

It cools, not freezes, the gas into a liquid form. That's why they call it LNG rather than SNG.

Other than that, excellent piece Grant!

Grant G said...

I fixed that error Mr. Kootcoot.

"An excellent piece"..Coming from you is a real compliment.

Thanks

dinknut said...

The Farm Film Report was from SCTV not Saturday Night Live ...FYI

Grant G said...

Dinknut...Thanks for that info..I watched SCTV in my youth...waaaay back when, loved the show, it was a one of a kind and world class comedy..

Most of the SCTV players went on to bigger and better things..

Saturday night live couldn`t hold a candle to SCTV with content, Saturday Night Live had big names and ratings, SCTV had cutting edge comedy..ooohhh...Count Dracula and the ongoing scary nightmare theatre skit...It`s all coming back..

In fact, I think I`ll go youtubing for archived episodes.

And...

I have made the correction..

In writing this post, not sure why that "Blows up real good" line popped in my mind, but it did.

And tragically..

Mankind loves to blow stuff up..

Happy Halloween, and be careful not to blow up any fingers with fireworks..

And lastly...Love that website you follow.

Cheers from the Persuader(a huge SCTV fan)

Good Day

Anonymous said...

Another one of your very best Grant, reads like a tragicomedy. Cluck Cluck Clark needs to get a new puppeteer.

Jean

Elwood said...

Grant, off topic, but good news today about the turn down of Prosperity Mine. Fish Lake and area is now saved. I hope!

Elwood said...

Grant, off topic, but good news today about the turn down of Prosperity Mine. Fish Lake and area is now saved. I hope!

Grant G said...

Fish Lake big and little fish lake will be saved, project is dead..

Thanks to all of you for fighting to save it..

Thanks Jean.

Cheers

kootcoot said...

"Fish Lake big and little fish lake will be saved, project is dead.."

I wouldn't count on that yet. Cabinet has final say and the goofy lady from the NWT is minister in charge of the file. Obviously Ms. Photo-op won't be an obstacle, they approved it last time and only the now departed from the criminal organization known as the Harper Government (tm), Jim Prentiss cancelled it last time.

It still may take bodies and resistance to really stop it.

Anonymous said...

http://www.smh.com.au/business/china-wary-of-sourcing-too-much-gas-from-the-us-20131110-2xa06.html?skin=text-only

Christy and co., are you even paying attention? They don't need the gas. This is China, remember that. Things haven't changed really.

Anonymous said...

You know Grant, you make it so simple that even a college undergraduate could understand. Never mind Cambridge or the Sorbonne.
And yet our esteemed Leader can't seem to absorb it. Its very scary to realize that she can't grasp this concept but she gets dumped into a room full of diplomats, scientists, proven intellects and college graduates and is expected to ratchet a deal for the families of BC.
She's so fortunate that she's got a pleasant smile or I figger she'd get blown out of the water!
She's got the assets alright, and the stamina to survive those all night bargaining sessions
John's Aghast!

Lulymay said...

I'm just watching a program on TV while reading these comments and a professional has just said: "she think she can convince anybody of anything... and that's the definition of a psychopath". Gosh, the timing couldn't have been better.

Anonymous said...

http://boingboing.net/2014/10/31/secret-recording-of-corporate.html

On behalf of Agent K said...

I realize there has been a huge ongoing campaign about fresh waters sales from Canada to the United States and to be quite frank, I never understood why. Water is a renewable resource. It evaporates and come back to us as rain. Now I realize why it is a concern. They are polluting massive amounts of water for fresh water fracking.

CBC is reporting that "the Western Canada Wilderness Committee and the Sierra Club filed a petition against the B.C. Oil and Gas Commission and energy company EnCana Corp. over the commission's decision to grant repeat short-term water approvals to the company. The environmental groups wanted the court to declare the approvals a violation of the provincial Water Act. They also asked a judge to quash several such permits issued to Encana. But in a decision posted this week on the court website, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Shelley Fitzpatrick dismissed the application."

Why was the application dismissed? "Days before the court hearing began, the provincial government introduced its updated Water Sustainability Act, which expressly allows recurrent short-term approvals. But the previous legislation did not prohibit such approvals." Christy Clark and the BC Liberals changed the law that they were breaking days before the trial. The Water Sustainability Act does the exact opposite of what it claims just like Harper's not about Crime bill does and just like the US Patriot Act does.

"Court heard that in 2012, the oil and gas commission granted the industry access to 20.4 million cubic metres of surface water. About seven million were for fracking — 54 per cent of that from short-term approvals." The judge lied and said only a small percentage of the water the US gets from Canada is being used in fresh water fracking. That is a lie. The US is using massive amounts of fresh water for fracking. Instead of using it for drinking or irrigation they use it for fracking. We give them water for drinking and irrigation so they can use theirs for fracking. It's that simple.

Recently Gwyn Morgan criticized New Brunswick and Nova Scotia's decision to join with Quebec to ban fracking because of the massive amounts of water it pollutes. Apparently they have banned liquid propane fracking as well as fresh water fracking. There is a huge difference between the two. Fresh water fracking involves putting massive amounts of toxic chemicals into the water to make fracking fluid which leaves toxic tailing ponds behind. Fracking with propane does not.

As one blog reader pointed out, fracking with liquid natural gas doesn't pollute massive amounts of fresh water like fresh water fracking does. He claims one Alberta company does fracking with propane not water and they have some oil wells in northern BC. The problem is not all the BC oil wells use propane fracking instead of fresh water fracking.

The same concern exists in the United States. The massive amounts of fresh water they are still using for fracking is creating a drought from Texas to California. We need to put a moratorium on fresh water fracking in BC and the export of BC water for fresh water fracking. Claiming they aren't uing it for fracking is untrue. If the BC Liberals won't do it we need to elect someone else who will.

Heating with natural gas is good. Heating with coal is bad. Fracking with liquid propane is good. Fracking with fresh water is bad. Fracking with liquid propane costs more. That's why some companies won't do it. The public need to force them to. It's a matter of public safety.

Just for the Record said...

California Halts Fracking Waste Injections; Fears "Danger To Life, Health, & Natural Resources"

Seven independent oil companies have been ordered to halt state-approved wastewater injection work this week, according to The Bakersfied Californian, The cessation of fracking is out of concern they may be contaminating Kern County drinking water. As ProPublica reports [4], The state’s Division of Oil and Gas and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) is warning that they may be injecting their waste into aquifers that could be a source of drinking water, and stating that their waste disposal “poses danger to life, health, property, and natural resources.”

As The Bakersfield Californian reports, Emergency orders issued Wednesday by the California Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources apply to 11 disposal wells east and northeast of Bakersfield. About 100 water wells are located within a mile radius of the disposal wells.

Oil and water officials say the wells may have injected "produced water" -- the toxic and sometimes radioactive liquid that comes up during oil production -- and possibly injected fracking fluid at relatively shallow depths that contain relatively low salinity, oil-free water suitable for drinking and irrigation.

State officials said they have found no evidence the underground injections, some approved by DOGGR as long ago as the 1970s and others very recently, have ever contaminated drinking or irrigation water. Pollution has not been ruled out, however, as regulators conduct site inspections and await test results and other information from the companies.

DOGGR's action has come amid a year-old crackdown on industry practices for disposing of oil field fluids.

"We need to make sure that the water that they're going after, if it's potable now, let's make sure that it stays that way and we're not injecting produced water," said Jason Marshall, chief deputy director of DOGGR's parent agency, the state Department of Conservation.

The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board issued orders Wednesday concurrent with DOGGR's action. Its letters to the same seven companies set deadlines for turning over groundwater samples, analytical data and technical reports.

"Our orders are focused on the (geological) formation where the injection happened and looking at the quality of that formation water," said Jonathan Bishop, chief deputy director for the State Water Resources Board.

Fortunately, he said, it appears a "large proportion" of the wells' injection zones are at a much deeper depth than the nearby water wells.

While that's "good news," he said, the state lacks data on many of the surrounding private wells. Inspectors are trying to gather such information now, he added.

But some of the injection wells at issue seem to be within 500 feet of the depth of the water wells.

"That is of more concern to us," he said.

* * *

This comes on the heels of earthquake concerns we reported previously and NY's fracking setback.

http://www.bakersfieldcalifornian.com/business/kern-gusher/x634489929/State-poised-to-shut-down-11-local-oil-injection-wells

Anonymous said...

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/27170-given-scant-information-activists-struggle-to-fight-new-pipeline-in-iowa

Anonymous said...

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-11-02/american-dream-you-have-be-asleep-believe-it

Hugh said...

Chevron makes $5.6 billion profit in one quarter:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-business/us-business/lng-tax-moves-buoy-chevrons-interest/article21420331/