Compendium of Regulatory Requirements Governing Underground Injection of Drilling Wastes Page: 6 of 14
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Permitting Issues and Limits
If produced water is discharged to streams or other surface water bodies, it must be authorized by
an NPDES permit. The permit writer must first determine the applicable technology-based limits
and then add water-quality-based limits as necessary.
Alabama - The Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) began issuing
NPDES permits that were based on the coal mining ELGs and added other water quality-based
limits. The following two paragraphs summarize portions of a May 1993 publication entitled
"Coalbed Methane Produced Water Management Guide Treatment and Discharge to Surface
Waters: Black Warrior Basin, Alabama."2
"In Alabama, the construction and operation of CBM wells are regulated by the
State of Alabama Oil and Gas Board and CBM discharge permits are handled by
the Water Division, Mining and Nonpoint Source Section of ADEM. Initial
permits were based on total dissolved solids (TDS), and discharges were limited
to an instream TDS concentration of 500 mg/1. As the number of CBM wells
increased sharply in the mid to late 1980s, ADEM began to enact more stringent
discharge requirements to protect the water quality of the Black Warrior River.
In 1988, EPA published an Ambient Water Quality Criteria for Chloride which
established a National Chloride Criterion of 230 mg/l and ADEM then adopted
rules whereby applicants were permitted to release produced waters into surface
streams if the instream concentration of chloride beyond a mixing zone would not
exceed 230 mg/1. However, because of the perceived difficulty in enforcing this
standard the state developed a total loading criterion for CBM operations at the
point of discharge. The allocation for each CBM operator was based on a
calculated loading beginning at a point above the discharge, with additional
allocations permitted downstream because of additional tributary waters provided
dilution for additional chlorides. This procedure calculated the allowable mass
loading [the number of pounds per day] for chlorides that will not exceed an
instream concentration of 230 mg/1. These permits were later referred to as Tier I
permits. To allow growth while still protecting aquatic resources, CBM operators
and ADEM jointly developed guidelines for instream monitoring of chloride
concentration as the basis for additional NPDES permits. These permits were
called Tier II permits and were issued with instream chloride concentration limits
rather than the mass limits used in Tier I permits."
2 Summary provided to John Veil by Carey Johnston, U.S. EPA Office of Water, Engineering
Analysis Division on November 30, 2001.5
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Puder, Markus G.; Bryson, Bill & Veil, John A. Compendium of Regulatory Requirements Governing Underground Injection of Drilling Wastes, report, March 3, 2003; Tulsa, Oklahoma. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc737411/m1/6/: accessed May 2, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.