Good news on gas flaringWhile ND flaring increased in February, period of time a well flares declining Mike Ellerd For Petroleum News Bakken
In his monthly press conference, North Dakota Oil and Gas Division Director Lynn Helms said flaring in North Dakota increased to 30.4 percent in February, up from the 29 percent where flaring had been for four months. However, while that increase is negative news at first blush, Helms said there is actually more to the flaring story that put the situation in a more positive light.
Going back to 2007, Helms said his group looked at the actual number of days that a typical North Dakota well was flared. In 2007, he says, a typical well was flared for 380 days, but by 2011 that number had fallen by more than half to 172 days. Then by the end of 2012, the number fell by more than two-thirds to 51 days.
So even though the amount of natural gas flared in the state continues to hover around 30 percent, with the number of days that a typical well is flared declining fast, efforts to curb flaring are paying off. He said with the ongoing construction of gathering systems, the state is “catching up.”
Challenges remain But challenges remain, and Helms noted that there is an “enormous backlog” of wells that are still flaring. For example, he said, there are still 155 wells flaring that were installed in 2011 that don’t have a short-term plan for connecting.
“Flaring is going to be something we wrestle with from month to month to month,” Helms said. “We’ll make a lot of progress in the summer months I think, but not so much in the winter months.”
Helms said the North Dakota Industrial Commission is cutting down on the time allowed for gas to be flared from a well. At one point, he said, the commission was granting extensions on a semi-annual basis. Helms said as an example, if a request were submitted this time of year, an extension could be granted for up to nine months. However, he said the commission has now reduced that to a quarterly basis so operators will be looking at extensions in the three to six month range.
Incentives proposed But Helms also pointed to House Bill 1134, a bill introduced by Rep. Todd Porter that provides tax incentives for new gathering systems as well as incentives for other flaring alternatives. Having passed both houses of the North Dakota legislature, that bill is now in a conference committee.
Justin Kringstad, director of the North Dakota Pipeline Authority, told Petroleum News Bakken that the number of new wells getting connected to gas sales increased to nearly 130 after several previous months of decline. In comparison, 150 new wells went on production in February (see related story on page 10).
But the downside to those numbers is that at the end of the month, more wells went on production than were connected to gas sales, resulting in an uptick in the total number of wells in the state that are not connected to gas sales. The ultimate goal is to get to a point where the number of wells connecting to gas sales surpasses the number of wells going on production — that is what will close the gap on flaring.
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