We previously wrote about a record number of oil & gas spills in Weld County for January 2024, and have a disappointing update … a record 132 spills were reported for May 2024, the most ever, representing 87% of all the spills reported for the month in Colorado.
See these spills on a map of Weld County.
Here's a breakdown by offending facility type for the YTD months of 2024:
| Facility Type | January 2024 | February 2024 | March 2024 | April 2024 | May 2024 | June 2024 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TANK BATTERY | 41 | 24 | 21 | 28 | 50 | 38 | 202 |
| WELL | 24 | 31 | 39 | 35 | 30 | 22 | 181 |
| FLOWLINE SYSTEM | 16 | 11 | 6 | 25 | 36 | 33 | 127 |
| (blank) | 18 | 4 | 11 | 6 | 9 | 3 | 51 |
| GAS GATHERING PIPELINE SYSTEM | 3 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 17 |
| OFF-LOCATION FLOWLINE | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 8 |
| PRODUCED WATER TRANSFER SYSTEM | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| PIPELINE | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| CENTRALIZED EP WASTE MGMT FAC | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| GAS PROCESSING PLANT | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
And here's the breakdown for the top 10 offending operators for the YTD months of 2024:
| Operator | January 2024 | February 2024 | March 2024 | April 2024 | May 2024 | June 2024 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NOBLE ENERGY INC | 38 | 30 | 27 | 40 | 51 | 57 | 243 |
| KERR MCGEE OIL & GAS ONSHORE LP | 32 | 23 | 25 | 37 | 45 | 11 | 173 |
| PDC ENERGY INC | 8 | 2 | 15 | 5 | 10 | 13 | 53 |
| CRESTONE PEAK RESOURCES OPERATING LLC | 4 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 6 | 6 | 28 |
| BONANZA CREEK ENERGY OPERATING COMPANY LLC | 2 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 18 |
| KP KAUFFMAN COMPANY INC | 7 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 16 |
| HIGHPOINT OPERATING CORPORATION | 5 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 2 | 11 |
| DCP OPERATING COMPANY LP | 3 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 10 |
| FUNDARE RESOURCES OPERATING COMPANY LLC | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 9 |
| EXTRACTION OIL & GAS INC | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 7 |
The Impact of Spills
These graphs show the relative impact of spills in Weld County by category since the ECMC started collecting their spill data via the current Form 19 in 2014.
Notes and Observations
- As mentioned above, the 132 spills for May 2024 in Weld County represent 87% of the 152 spills reported for all of Colorado.
- The worst offenders are Noble Energy and Kerr McGee, who have been responsible for a total of 889 and 921 spills in Weld County, respectively. They both operate over 9,000 wells in Weld County, about half of which are plugged and abandoned.
- Operators are less successful in fully recovering oil and produced water spills than they are for other categories of spills, such as condensate and drilling fluids.
- The large spikes in oil spilled are from two spills in 2016 and 2020 where very little of the spilled oil was recovered.
- The large spike in produced water spilled in 2019 is from two separate instances where a lightning strike caused a fire.