Environmental assessment of oil degasification at four Strategic Petroleum Reserve facilities in Texas and Louisiana
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) proposes to treat gassy oil at four Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) storage sites to lower the gas content of the stored crude oil and help ensure safe transfer of the oil during drawdown. The crude oil is stored underground in caverns created in salt domes. The degree of gassiness of the oil varies substantially among sites and among caverns within a site. This environmental assessment describes the proposed degasification operation, its alternatives, and potential environmental impacts. The need for degasification has arisen because over time, gases, principally methane and nitrogen, have migrated into and become dissolved in the stored crude oil. This influx of gas has raised the crude oil vapor pressure above limits required by safety and emission guidelines. When oil is drawn from the caverns, excess gases may come out of solution. Based on preliminary data from an ongoing sampling program, between 200 and 350 million of the 587 million barrels of crude oil stored at these four sites would require processing to remove excess gas. Degasification, a commonly used petroleum industry process, would be done at four crude oil storage facilities: Bryan Mound and Big Hill in Texas, and West Hackberry and Bayou Choctaw in Louisiana. DOE would use a turnkey services contract for engineering, procurement, fabrication, installation, operation and maintenance of two degasification plants. These would be installed initially at Bryan Mound and West Hackberry. Degasification would be complete in less than three years of continuous operations. This report summarizes the environmental impacts of this gasification process.
- Research Organization:
- Department of Energy, Washington, DC (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 10116771
- Report Number(s):
- DOE/EA--0954; ON: DE95005155; NC: NONE
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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