Category: Energy

Oil worker

Diesel Exhaust: An Ever-Present Hazard

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) recently published a fact sheet on hazards faced by workers in the oil and gas (O&G) extraction sector. One such hazard is exposure to diesel exhaust (DE), which contains diesel particulate matter (DPM).

Oil pipeline

Keystone XL Approval Vacated by U.S. Judge

TransCanada’s plans to construct the Keystone XL Pipeline and the U.S. Department of State’s (DOS) approval of those plans ran into another wall when a U.S. District Court judge in Montana found that the DOS had not met its statutory requirements in analyzing the effects of the project on climate change and on species protected […]

Fracking Oil Drilling Rig

Terms of Disagreement in BLM’s Waste Prevention Rule Revision

In a final rule published in the early fall (September 28, 2018, (Federal Register (FR)), the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) withdrew or revised many provisions of the previous administration’s regulations to reduce waste of natural gas from venting, flaring, and leaks during oil and natural gas production activities on onshore federal and Indian […]

Cooling towers, water cooling

All Challenges to Cooling Water Rule Denied by 2nd Circuit

The EPA’s promulgation of multiple rules since 2001 to protect aquatic species that get swept into (entrainment) and against (impingement) industrial cooling water intake structures (CWISs) has met with legal challenges from both environmental groups and industry.

Alternative, Low-Cost NOx Monitoring Options from EPA

Under a new EPA proposal, approximately 310 sources subject to monitoring under the Agency’s NOx SIP Call regulations would be able to use options to the emissions monitoring requirements now required by the regulations.

Revision of O&G Waste Prevention Rule Completed by BLM

The Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has completed its effort to bring a 2016 Obama-era rule governing emissions from oil and natural gas (O&G) operations on federal and Indian lands in line with the current administration’s policy of promoting the development of these resources without regulatory “burdens that unnecessarily encumber energy […]

Transportation fuel oil gas

GHG Program in Oregon Found (Appropriately) Discriminatory

In a majority opinion, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit found that Oregon state violated neither the dormant Interstate Commerce Clause nor a provision of the federal Clean Air Act (CAA) when it assigned a carbon intensity value to transportation fuels produced out of state and imported into Oregon, […]

O&G refinery emissions

EPA Looks to Overhaul O&G Methane Rule

In its proposal to revise portions of the Obama EPA’s 2016 New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) to control emissions of the methane and other air pollutants from crude oil and natural gas facilities (40 CFR part 60, subpart OOOOa), the Trump EPA has made its intentions clear—save the oil and gas (O&G) industry up to […]

Power plant

Massachusetts Supreme Court Affirms Power Sector GHG Regs

Shortly after the Trump EPA proposed to replace the Obama EPA’s Clean Power Plan with its more industry-friendly Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) rule, the Massachusetts Supreme Court went in the opposite direction by denying a petition to overturn a state regulation imposing a progressive cap on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for the power sector.

Power Plant

Power Plants Take an Interest in Dry Cooling

The use of ambient air to cool and condense steam at electric power plants is a costly alternative to water cooling, but the use of air, or dry cooling, is being gradually adopted by energy companies, reports the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). Dry cooling or hybrid cooling—a combination of air and water—occurs in 3% […]