Flaring Alternative Reduces Emissions in Oil & Gas, Wastewater Treatment, Landfills

ElectraTherm says is new technology offers an emissions-reducing flaring alternative for oil and gas, wastewater treatment and landfills.

The distributed, waste heat to power generation company completed a project in the Bakken oil field demonstrating how its Power+ Generator reduces flaring while generating low-emission electricity.

ElectraTherm partnered with the Environmentally Friendly Drilling Program, managed by the Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC), Gulf Coast Green Energy and the Hess Corporation to operate ElectraTherm’s Power+ Generator at a Hess oil well in North Dakota. Data from the project found using the Power+ Generator produced an 89 percent reduction in CO, 48 percent reduction in NOX and 93 percent reduction in VOCs.

The Power+ utilizes raw gas that would otherwise be flared to generate low-emission electricity. The same Power+ system can run on biogas at wastewater treatment plants and landfills to reduce flaring and emissions while generating clean electricity, the company says.

In North Dakota, both the state regulators and the EPA are pushing to reduce open flaring of natural gas. The Texas A&M Institute of Renewable Natural Resources (IRNR) conducted research and collected data from the Hess test site in the Bakken Shale during September 2015. The data was part of an emissions research study for comparing emissions from the Power+ system to the emissions from open flaring.

According to the report, “It is important to note that the emissions from the Power+ Generator system’s boiler are lower (comparatively less harmful to the environment) and would provide the added utility of power generated for use from the raw gas or fuel gas which would otherwise be wasted.”