Hot gas again concerns SD smog cops - SDUT

[Hans Laetz, Newsgroup Editor]

[Editor's note: great article, but the lede is buried. 40 percent of
the nat gas burned in vehicles in So Cal doesn't meet state standards,
because it burns too hot, and Sempra says it's too expensive to inject
nitrogen -- like it promised to do -- to bring the gas in line with
state pollution laws.]

Gas from afar pollutes here, critics say
County officials concerned that use of LNG will lead to more smog in
the region

By Onell R. Soto, San Diego Union-Tribune

San Diego’s air quality folks are worried that natural gas imported
from overseas could erase decades of work cleaning San Diego’s air.

County officials say that San Diego Gas & Electric, which operates the
region’s natural gas pipelines and distribution lines, is allowing the
import of the extra-polluting gas and hasn’t taken steps to minimize
its impact.

“If you’re doing something today that is increasing the emissions in
the air, you have an obligation to clean that up,” said County
Supervisor Ron Roberts, who also serves on the state Air Resources
Board.

SDG&E says the natural gas — used since October for heating, cooking
and power generation in the county’s homes and businesses, and in
trucks and buses — meets the state’s pipeline standards. The company
questions the county’s findings that it increases pollution in the
region.

It also says it’s powerless to stop the gas at the border, even though
it’s imported through a terminal owned by a sister company, Sempra
LNG. And it says very similar gas already is being used in the region.
At issue is liquefied natural gas, also known as LNG.

It’s regular natural gas, but what’s in it and the process by which it
is transported makes it burn hotter than the natural gas we’ve been
using until now, said Bob Kard, who heads the San Diego County Air
Pollution Control District.

He calls it hot gas.

LNG is shipped by big tankers from Indonesia, Russia and Qatar. To get
it on the ships, it’s cooled to 260 degrees below zero Fahrenheit,
until it turns into a liquid. Some of the inert gases, like nitrogen,
however, don’t make the trip across the ocean. And the natural gas has
more of some other fuels that increase its heat content.

Once it arrives at a terminal near Ensenada called Energia Costa Azul,
it’s warmed back up and put into pipelines.

It’s used in power plants in Mexico. It’s also brought into the United
States.

Last year, about 4.3 percent of the natural gas used in the region
came in through that pipeline.

That meant that generally, once every 23 days or so, you cooked with
that gas. It was used to make electricity. It was used to get MTS bus
riders around town. It was used in factories and to heat office
buildings.

The gas meets state pipeline standards but not standards for use in
motor vehicles. SDG&E got an exemption to allow it to be used in buses
and trucks.

The county figures that if this gas is used throughout the region,
replacing traditional supplies, that would result in four to five tons
a day of extra pollution, specifically smog-causing chemicals known as
volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides.

To put that in perspective, a typical summer day in the county will
bring 157 tons of nitrogen oxides and 159 tons of volatile organic
compounds. Most of that comes from cars, buses and trucks.

“We get concerned when we see (additions of) a tenth of a ton,”
Roberts said. “I get very concerned when I see four or five.”

The problem isn’t how the gas is used in big, new natural-gas-fired
power plants, because they have sophisticated controls to make sure
they don’t pollute too much and adjust for differences in the fuel
they use.
It’s how it works in furnaces, small power plants, stoves and older
vehicles, where there isn’t the possibility to adjust how it’s used.

Kard and Roberts say the extra pollution will set back work the county
is required to do, by law, to clear San Diego’s air.

“What you’re talking about is basically having a company that is
directly responsible for adding a lot of additional pollutants to the
air, and we’re going to have to find a way to get those out,” Roberts
said.

That may well mean stricter controls on companies with emission
permits. Those permits are issued under state and federal law to
businesses that produce air pollutants, such as dry cleaners, coffee
roasters, auto body shops and power plants.

“They’re basically going to cause other businesses and other entities
to clear up their problem,” he said.
SDG&E says the county is overstating the problem.

The study on which it’s basing its estimate is wrong, and other
studies are under way to determine the impact of using LNG on the
region’s air quality, said utility spokesman Art Larson.

The county’s study, he said, was inconclusive.

“No one knows what that number is,” Larson said. “We believe that Mr.
Kard has no hard, factual evidence to support his estimate.”

Plus, it’s myopic to focus simply on LNG, said Kathleen Teora, a
spokeswoman for the SDG&E sister company that operates the Baja import
terminal.

“The issue of gas quality is much broader than an isolated
disagreement between the local air district and Sempra LNG or any
other individual entity,” she said. “LNG is just one minor part of the
equation.”
All the natural gas delivered to SDG&E, whether from an LNG terminal
or from fields in Texas, Colorado or Canada, has to meet the state’s
pipeline standards.

Those standards were arrived at by the California Public Utilities
Commission after hearing from air pollution regulators in Los Angeles
and San Diego.

“The CPUC has left the door open to take another look at these
standards,” she said. “If new, compelling evidence is brought forward
by the (air pollution control districts), the CPUC should be willing
to revisit this issue.”

Spokespeople for the commission said county officials have not
approached them recently. Air quality concerns were considered in
2006, when the pipeline standards were set, but the commission
ultimately sided with gas companies and against pollution control
officials.

As for use in motor vehicle, Larson said about 40 percent of the gas
SDG&E distributes doesn’t meet the state standards.

That’s OK, he said, because a very small amount of gas is used that
way, less than 1 percent, and because today’s modern engines are
better able to deal with different kinds of gas, which they use as
compressed natural gas, or CNG.

And because it meets the pipeline standards, SDG&E is legally required
to take it because the company is a common carrier. The gas company
buys only a third of the gas that courses through its pipelines. The
rest is bought by big users of natural gas, like power plants.

SDG&E didn’t have the option to reject the gas and keep the CNG trucks
and buses on the road.
And taking them off the road would cause big problems for riders — the
majority of MTS buses run on CNG — or put diesel-powered vehicles back
out there, causing even more pollution.

Because SDG&E had to take the gas, the only way to keep using it as a
vehicle fuel was to get an exemption, Larson said.

The only difference between the gas that’s been coming in from the LNG
terminal and that which meets the state motor vehicle standards is in
the amount of inert gases, he said.

Sempra LNG, SDG&E’s sister company, has the ability to inject
nitrogen, an inert gas, into the supply coming out of the import
terminal, said Teora, the spokeswoman.

But it doesn’t make economic sense to inject enough nitrogen to meet
the vehicle standards set by the Air Resources Board. That’s because
there are only a few older vehicles on the road that can’t deal with
newer formulations. A better solution, she said, is to scrap the motor
vehicle standard and set up a new one more in line with today’s
engines.

Roberts and Kard are upset that the Air Resources Board gave SDG&E the
go-ahead to put the gas into buses and trucks.

They say state officials violated laws designed to protect the
environment by not considering the effect of the exemption requested
by SDG&E and Southern California Gas.

A few weeks ago, the head of the California Air Resources Board, Mary
Nichols, responded to concerns.
Like SDG&E’s Larson, she said that the alternative to granting the
exemption would be to take CNG buses and trucks off the road.

She also denied there was a violation of state environmental laws,
which don’t apply to experimental exemptions like this one.