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Nancy Vehr WYDEQ Air Quality Division Director Dr. Alexia Harrist State Epidemiologist / Health Officer for the Wyoming Department of Health WYDEQ Ozone meeting GenTherm Thermoelectric Generator Pilot program by Jonah Energy Old pumps Jonah is doing a pilot test to replace these pumps with new thermoelectric power generators to cut methane emissions by more than 98%. Video of Ozone meeting

Wyoming DEQ has video footage available on YouTube of their Pre-Winter Ozone Season Open House held in the Pinedale Library on November 28th. During the meeting, Air Quality Division Director Nancy Vehr gave several updates:

- There have been 5 consecutive winters of the Upper Green River Basin being below ozone standards.
- 2017 had record levels of snowfall and there were 7 days recorded above the standards for acceptable levels of ozone in the Upper Green River Basin.
- In the fall of 2016, Wyoming Governor Matt Mead recommended that all of Wyoming be designated as in attainment or attainment/unclassifiable. Sublette, Sweetwater and Lincoln County have been designated by the EPA as "Attainment/Non-Classifiable" for the new lower 2015 ozone standards. "That’s great news. That’s attributed to a lot of hard work on everybody, the citizens, the industry, and the regulatory entities all working together. Our goal is to keep underneath that standard every winter."
- DEQ will be doing regular communication updates about every 2 weeks. They now have a regular point of contact person, Brian Hall. They will continue their daily ozone forecasts during January, February & March. They will continue to track VOCs at key locations during the winter ozone season. This is the 12th year of Wyoming DEQ’s speciated winter ozone season monitoring program.
- DEQ has realized that some of the ozone episodes seem to last a little longer than a day. They have asked industry to think about things they can do to minimize emissions the day after an Ozone Action Day. They’ve also started a voluntary Ozone Action Plan available for individuals and businesses who wish to sign up as participating in the Contingency program for Ozone Action Days and the days after an Ozone Action Day.
- The study on ozone emissions from waste disposal ponds was released this past fall and is available.
- No additional rules or regulations are planned for compliance from Wyoming DEQ for emission reduction in the Upper Green River Basin. Monitoring will continue and operate under the Existing Source Rule that went into effect last year.

Dr. Alexia Harrist, State Epidemiologist/Health Officer for the Wyoming Department of Health was also present and made a brief presentation, as well as having a table with ozone and health related literature and how people can protect themselves. She said the goal of the WDH is to inform, educate and empower people as much as possible about their health. "There has been a lot of good research on the kind of health effects people experience when they are exposed to ozone."

Representatives from a number of oil & gas companies were present with information on their operations. Jonah Energy had a display on a pilot program they are doing installing thermoelectric power generators (TEGs) made by GenTherm to operate pumps that run glycol through their natural gas lines. The TEGs operate on natural gas from the system. They have no moving parts and are therefore very low maintenance. The results are showing emissions during the two month pilot test that the new TEGs prevent more than 98% of waste methane emissions from being vented out to the atmosphere. The company is continually looking for ways to reduce emissions from their operations.

Members of the local CURED group (Citizens United for Responsible Energy Development) were also present to talk about concerns local community members have about natural gas development in the Upper Green River Basin and impacts to citizen and worker’s health from emissions. Elaine Crumpley, a member of the CURED board, said, "Let’s revisit the health issue. Let’s come up with some tangible information about the Upper Green and what it’s doing to our health. We want to continue to cut down further on all the emissions."

Click on this link to go to the Wyoming DEQ page about the November 28, 2017 Open House:
http://deq.wyoming.gov/aqd/news/pre-winter-ozone-season-open-house

Click on this link to view the video highlights from the DEQ Ozone Update Open House:
YouTube video