New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) How do these standards affect the oil and gas industry?

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has recently updated their New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) for reducing greenhouse gas emissions as it pertains to the oil and gas sector, specifically storage vessels. These standards became effective on September 23, 2013 when EPA published the Final Amendment in the Federal Register under 40 CFR Part 60. This means they are enforceable by appropriate legal authorities (i.e. EPA, TCEQ, and ODEQ).

NSPS Quad O standards

Those facilities that EPA considers “affected” (each individual tank battery is considered a separate facility) are subject to the NSPS requirements, therefore; those operators/owners must control their air emissions and comply with rigorous reporting and monitoring restraints established in each federal or state issued permit. However, most of the requirements can be avoided by capturing the emissions with a vapor recovery unit (VRU) because EPA does not consider VRUs as control devices, therefore exempting them from almost all reporting/monitoring requirements when the operator does not need to take an enforceable limit on the unit.
For more information on NSPS Quad O standards, contact our lead environmentalist at enviro@otacompression.com.

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