DENVER-
Colorado environmental and community groups want federal officials to make the state regulate oil and gas drilling rig engines, which they claim spew harmful air pollution that will get worse because of the energy boom.
Denver-based Rocky Mountain Clean Air Action and several groups in western Colorado, a hot spot of natural gas development, sent a petition Wednesday to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Stephen Johnson.
An industry official said energy companies have made great strides in reducing pollution and questioned whether the industry is unfairly being targeted.
Late last year, the Colorado Air Quality Control Commission approved the first-ever statewide emissions standards for the oil and gas industry when it imposed ozone limits. It also strengthened existing pollution rules in a nine-county area in eastern Colorado, including Denver, to meet federal ozone standards.
Some of the same groups that pushed for tougher ozone pollution regulations want the state to clamp down on the “smoking drill rigs.” Their petition seeks elimination of an exemption for many of the engines powering the drilling rigs, which are at a site for a few days to several weeks, depending on the number of wells drilled and the geology.
But Jeremy Nichols of Rocky Mountain Clean Air Action said the state should formally track the emissions to answer such questions.
“We need to rein in smoking rigs and keep people and communities across Colorado safe and healthy,” Nichols said.
The petitioners said the drilling rig engines are releasing as much as 79,000 tons of nitrogen oxide a year, based on estimates of emissions per well in a 2005 report done for the Western Governors” Association.
Declared in compliance with federal standards in 2002, the Denver area is now struggling to cut ozone pollution that state health officials say is up because of the thousands of new oil and gas wells in the state.
Marc Smith, executive director of the Denver-based Independent Petroleum Association of the Mountain States, said energy companies participate in an EPA program that promotes the latest technology and procedures to cut pollution. Smith, though, questioned the impact of emissions from drilling rig engines compared to other sources, including cars and trucks.
“At some point, I guess, we have a sense that we’re being singled out,” Smith said.
Pollution from nitrogen oxide is linked to “a slew of adverse health and environmental impacts,” Nichols said, including acid rain and haze.
Most smaller drilling rig engines aren’t regulated in Colorado, but permits are needed for 1,200-horsepower engines and larger, said Mike Silverstein, manager of planning and policy for the state air pollution control division.
The newer, larger engines increasingly used to drill multiple wells from one pad emit less pollution, Silverstein said.
The state, though, acknowledges that the levels of pollution from the engines “is an area for further study and assessment,” he added.
Silverstein said the air quality division has commissioned a study on oil and gas facilities whose emissions aren’t regulated. The results could be released as early as July.
The EPA is taking a broad look at pollution from oil and gas development and is working with the state, said Cindy Cody, supervisor of air quality planning and management in the regional EPA office in Denver. She said EPA officials will review the petition on the drilling engine rigs.
EnCana Oil & Gas (USA), one of the region’s largest natural gas producers, is using a few natural-gas-fired engines in western Wyoming’s Jonah Field to reduce pollution, company spokesman Doug Hock said. EnCana is considering using natural gas engines in Colorado.
Hock said the company is also replacing old engines with newer, cleaner-burning engines.
