Coalbed Gas Safety
Coalbed gas or methane is natural gas; it is used to heat homes, cook food, and generate the electricity we use every day. It is not toxic, and it does not cause cancer. In certain conditions, coalbed gas is highly flammable or explosive. Caution should be used around coalbed gas just as you do around your gas appliances. In its natural state, coalbed gas does not smell. The odor you smell from a gas appliance around your home is mercaptan, an additive used to help identify leaks for safety reasons.
It is possible that some natural gas may leak around coalbed gas facilities. If the leaking gas flows into the air, it dissipates quickly and poses no danger. If it is confined and ignited by a fire source it can explode and will burn. Gas under pressure will hiss if a leak exists.
Safety is a top priority to the companies and individuals working in the coalbed gas industry. Companies rigorously train and prepare for potential hazards. On average, each employee working in the coalbed gas industry receives approximately one week of safety training each year. Training includes CPR, defensive driving, first aid, fire fighting, emergency shut downs and notifications, confined entry operations, electrical safety, and other specific gas related hazards. Some companies regularly conduct training exercises with local fire departments and emergency personnel.
Emergency Preparedness
The compression plants and the processing plants operate under strict government operational and safety regulations. Safety and environmental protection are top priorities at these facilities. Safety training, safety meetings, and emergency drills, coordinated with local emergency personnel are regularly conducted as part of normal operations. Plants are required to meet strict federal safety and environmental standards as well as state and local regulations.
Every gas well, pod building, and compressor facility is required to be identified by a sign, which contains the well name and the phone number of the operator. The pipelines that transport coalbed gas are clearly marked with pipeline markers. The markers stick out of the ground and are located at all road crossings and cross fences. The sign will list the product being transported as well as contact information for the company who owns the pipeline.
Most emergency situations can be identified by sight, sound or smell. If you see, hear or smell something that is unusual, leave the area and contact emergency personnel.
Methane Seeps
Some have predicted dangerous methane seeps associated with coalbed gas development in the Powder River Basin. While seepage may be possible, the extraction of the gas resource for commercial use dramatically reduces the chance of a dangerous methane seep by providing channels through which the gas can flow more easily than it can seep to the surface. This concept of directing the flow of gas into the wellbore and controlling its location has been used by the coal mines for safety reasons for many years.
Underground Fires
The Powder River Basin has been compared to other coalbed gas-rich areas and environmental concerns in those areas have been projected onto the development in Wyoming, without studying the important differences which exist.
Spontaneous combustion requires that an ignition source be present for the fire to start. In this situation it would be oxygen. Because the development of coalbed gas does not completely dewater the coal, there is no opportunity for oxygen to be introduced to the coal and begin combustion. Further, the fire would need a constant source of oxygen, which is not present.
In the Powder River Basin, we have the benefit of a “working laboratory” which has been in operation for over 20 years; the coal mines. From them we have learned that even with total dewatering of this coal aquifer, underground fires do not exist. They have experienced fires at or very near the surface, which are managed with either a vacuuming of the coal dust, or a dirt cover. Coalbed gas development does not require the laying open of the coal, so even these small surface fires are not possible.
Subsidence
The Powder River Basin’s working laboratory also serves as evidence for why the claims of subsidence possibilities are unfounded. Again, coalbed gas development does not dewater the coal aquifer in the same way coal mining requires. Even where the aquifer has been completely dewatered, twenty years of work shows that subsidence does not occur in front of the coal high wall. If not there, certainly not in relation to coalbed gas development.