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U.S. Department of the Interior Announces $775 Million to Plug Orphaned Oil and Gas Wells

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17 Aug, 2024

This post was originally published on Eco Watch

The U.S. Department of the Interior has announced $775 million in funding via the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and President Joe Biden’s Investing in America agenda for the purpose of plugging orphaned oil and gas wells.

Orphaned oil and gas wells are considered legacy pollution sites, according to the department. The remnant pollution from these sites can contaminate groundwater, harm local wildlife, increase the risk of flooding and sinkholes, and release harmful pollutants such as methane into the air.

As such, the Biden-Harris Administration on Wednesday announced additional funding for plugging these orphaned wells in 21 states. More than $1 billion has already been distributed toward this initiative, and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law has allotted $4.7 billion in total toward cleaning up these legacy pollution sites.

“President Biden’s Investing in America agenda is enabling us to confront long-standing environmental injustices by making a historic investment to plug orphaned wells throughout the country,” said Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland. “These investments are good for our climate, for the health of our communities, and for American workers. With this third round of additional funding, states will put more people to work to clean up these toxic sites, reduce methane emissions and safeguard our environment.” 

So far, states have already plugged more than 8,200 orphaned oil and gas wells, the department said.

There are 21 states eligible for this round of funding: Alabama, Alaska, California, Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, Wyoming.

According to an analysis published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology in 2022, the states with the highest amount of documented orphaned wells include Ohio, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma and Kentucky. As of April 2022, there were 123,318 documented orphaned wells in the U.S.

An orphaned well in Millersport, Ohio. Steven Jenkins / Flickr

Eligible states have until December 13 to apply for this phase of grant funding. Those that apply will be required to measure methane emissions from the orphaned wells that will be plugged through this round of funding, screen for groundwater and surface water pollution, and detail how they will prioritize which sites to plug first, including by considering disadvantaged communities and environmental and public health risks.

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law has further allocated $250 million for well cleanup in national parks and other public lands and nearly $40 million has been awarded to Tribal communities for plugging and remediating orphaned wells.

The post U.S. Department of the Interior Announces $775 Million to Plug Orphaned Oil and Gas Wells appeared first on EcoWatch.

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ABB receives EPD status for gearless mill drive ring motor

ABB receives EPD status for gearless mill drive ring motor

ABB has gained Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) status for its Gearless Mill Drive (GMD) ring motor — technology used to drive large grinding mills in the mining industry.

An EPD is a standardised document that provides detailed information about the environmental impact of a product throughout its life cycle. Based on a comprehensive Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study, the EPD highlights ABB’s commitment to transparency, environmental responsibility and supporting customers in making informed decisions on sustainability in their supply chains.

ABB analysed the environmental impact of a ring motor across its entire life cycle from supply chain and production to usage and end-of-life disposal. The study was conducted for a ring motor of a semi-autogenous grinding (SAG) mill with an installed power of 24 MW and was based on a reference service life of 25 years.

“Sustainability is at the core of our purpose at ABB, influencing how we operate and innovate for customers,” said Andrea Quinta, Sustainability Specialist at ABB. “By earning the Environmental Product Declaration for our ring motor, we emphasise our environmental stewardship and industry leadership for this technology. We adhered to the highest standards throughout this process, as we do in the ABB Ring Motor factory every day. This recognition highlights to the mining industry what they are bringing into their own operations when they work with ABB.”

The comprehensive LCA was conducted at ABB’s factory in Bilbao, Spain, and was externally verified and published in accordance with international standards ISO 14025 and ISO 14040/14044. It will remain valid for five years.

The ring motor, a key component of the GMD, is a drive system without any gears where the transmission of the torque between the motor and the mill is done through the magnetic field in the air gap between the motor stator and the motor rotor. It optimises grinding applications in the minerals and mining industries by enabling variable-speed operation, leading to energy and cost savings.

The full EPD for the ABB GMD Ring Motor can be viewed on EPD International.

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