Download History of NORM

Brief History of NORM in the
Oil/Gas Industry
Dr.Brian Heaton
Is it a new phenomenon?
The oil and gas industry has been working for
over 100 years is this a new problem or has it
been around for some time?
Is it a new phenomenon?
Radioactive scales have been recognised for
many years as being a problem when carrying
out well logging operations.
Definitive paper by Campbell in 1951:
Radioactivity Well Logging Anomalies,
Petroleum Engineer, Volume23 N0.6 pp7-12
Is it a new phenomenon?
Walter Fertl, the General manager for Dresser
Petroleum Engineering Services in Nov 1983 in
a paper in World Oil talks about the occurrence
of “radioactive crusts” providing valuable
supplementary information on:
Dynamic reservoir field conditions behind
perforated casing, recognition of faulty
cementing jobs, water break through profiles
and monitoring of oil/water contacts
Is it a new phenomenon?
Gesell wrote a paper for Health Physics in 1975
(29 pp681-687) entitled Occupational Exposure
due to Rn-22 in Natural Gas and Natural
Products.
In this paper he identified external radiation
fields and internal alpha particle exposure to the
respiratory tract and other organs due to Pb-210
and Po-210 as a problem.
Perception of Risk from Natural
Sources
• International Commission on Radiological
Protection recognised that Radon and Cosmic
Radiation and some Thorium ores may be a
problem in “ICRP 26” but rather played the
significance down. ICRP 26 does not refer to
NORM.
• Many countries did not have any legislation with
regard to NORM
• Health Physics professionals were not in general
very interested in the problems of NORM
(except Radon)
Perception of Risk from Natural
Sources
• The general public often do not perceive
natural radiation as being as dangerous as
man made radiation.
What changed?
• In 1981 a log on a production well on the
Occidental platform Piper Alpha went off
scale.
• Despite all the earlier papers this
appeared to be a surprise and people
actually thought that it could be from
Scandium 85 that was used to monitor
cement when it was being pumped.
What changed?
• Samples sent for counting showed that
radionuclides from both the Uranium-238
and Thorium-232 decay series were
present.
• The activity levels were high enough to
bring the material into the requirements of
the UK environmental legislation.
Radioactive Substances Act 1993
Element
Solid
Liquid
Gas
Becquerels per gram
Radium
0.37
0.00037
3.70x10-5
Lead
0.74
0.0074
1.11x10-4
Polonium
0.37
0.0037
2.22x10-4
Actinium
0.37
0.0037
2.59x10-6
Radon
3.70x10-2
Tubular from Piper Alpha
Implications under UK Legislation
• Discharges offshore and onshore cleaning
had to take place under licence from the
Environment Agency
• Occupational Exposure legislation had to
be complied with.
What happened Internationally?
• Very little. It was thought that the method
of oil extraction in the North Sea where
large volumes of seawater were being
pumped into the formation to maintain
pressure made the situation there different
from elsewhere.
• In 1985 Chevron in the USA looked at
tubulars from their fields and identified that
a problem existed.
What happened Internationally?
• In 1984 the E and P Forum based in the
UK set up a committee to look at the
problem. We sent out a questionnaire to
operators all over the world asking if they
had taken any measurements and what
results they had.
Situation Now
• In many countries progress is slow
because of lack of infrastructure to deal
with radioactive waste.
• Some countries still do not want to accept
they have a problem.
• For the operators it is not just a legislative
issue but also a reputational one.
• In some parts of the world there is also a
substantial litigation problem.
Given this history I hope that coming out of
the presentations and discussions we will
get some ideas on:
• Presenting the problem to management in
a way to get their support through a better
understanding of the problem.
• Finding solutions to some of our problems.
• Identifying a common approach to some of
these problems for the region.