Still time to comment on Moneta Divide expansion

Although the deadline has passed to send comments to the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) regarding the proposed drilling operation by Aethon Energy, comments will still be accepted by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) until July 19.

According to the permit application, millions of gallons of tainted water is slated to be dumped into Boysen Reservoir along with 2,161 tons of dissolved oilfield pollutants per month from the Moneta Divide oilfield if Aethon Energy is granted their permit.

The company is expanding to 4,250 wells between Shoshoni and Moneta.

These pollutants would go directly into Alkali and Badwater Creek as mixing zones before falling into Boysen. Allegedly, this will mix with the water in Boysen to dilute the pollution before its sent over the dam into the Wind River.

The production area encompasses approximately 265,434 acres which will include treated water discharge pipelines, disposal wells and associated facilities in the Shotgun and Madison disposal areas and a product pipeline that will travel through Fremont and Sweetwater counties to carry the product to Rawlins.

Aethon proposes to drill 4,100 directional and vertical natural gas and oil wells from single and multi-well pads during a 15-year develpoment period.

An eight-page document requesting the DEQ defer action on the permit was submitted by the Wyoming Outdoor Council in late June, suggesting there is information missing from Aethon’s permit package that they say prevents the DEQ from meeting their legal obligations to protect the water and the citizens of Wyoming.

According to the document, the Outdoor Council would like to see a “description of the treatment processes that will be used to remove well treatment chemicals.” In addition they want “evidence that the produced water is of good enough quality to be used for wildlife or livestock watering or other agricultural uses.”

The request goes on to ask for “evidence that the discharge will actually be used for wildlife or other agricultural uses, and that water quality and flow data for Alkali and Badwater creeks necessary to ensure that Wyoming water quality standards will be met.”

The Wyoming Outdoor Council says they are not opposed to the expansion of the Moneta Divide oil and gas field, but they want to ensure the development is carried out to protect the health and safety of Wyoming’s residents, meets water quality standards, and respects the rights of downstream water users.

The council is concerned Aethon’s application doesn’t contain the pertinent information needed to ensure the treated water doesn’t contain chemicals used in activities oerformed in and oil or gas well, chemicals that may be used for fracking, for example.

Apparently, within the project area, there are 70 hydraulic fracturing operations disclosed to the FracFocus Chemical Disclosure Registry and Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission records show approximately 350 wells in the project area have undergone stimulation operations.

Stimulation operations may include both hydraulic fracturing stimulation and matrix stimulation, such as acidizing.

The DEQ’s application for oil and gas production unit discharges requires the applicant, “provide a list of all potential pollutants expected to be in the discharge and an explanation of their presence in the discharge.”

In other words, Aethon needs to not only list the chemicals that may be present, but provide information on how they may end up in the discharge in the first place.

The Outdoor Council also argues that a blanket determination by Wyoming Game and Fish from 2002 cannot be reasonably used in this situation.

“Even if there were justification for continuation of the original discharge,” the document reads, “the proposed discharges are dramatically different – both in quality and in quantitiy – than what may have been discharged in 1978. Hydraulic fracturing was not occurring to the same extent it is being used now.”

The document went not only to the DEQ but was sent to Governor Mark Gordon as well.

If you still wish to comment on the Aethon Energy project, the Bureau of Land Management address is 5353 Yellowstone Road, Cheyenne, 82009.