Underreporting of natural gas spill by 240K gallons raises questions about North Dakota system

BISMARCK, N.D. — The North Dakota Health Department's acknowledgment this week that a 2015 pipeline leak of liquid natural gas is hundreds of thousands of gallons larger than reported raises questions about how many other spills and leaks are underreported — and state officials were not immediately able to answer Wednesday.

State Environmental Quality Chief Dave Glatt said the agency does not update initial public reports on spills but is considering doing so in the future.

"I get it — people want more information," Glatt said.

The agency said Tuesday that a 2015 pipeline spill of gas liquids, or "condensate," at a western North Dakota natural gas plant that was first reported as just 10 gallons is at least hundreds of thousands of gallons larger and may take an additional decade to clean up.

The initial state report on the spill at Oneok Partners LP's Garden Creek I gas processing plant was never updated, even as Oneok updated the state on cleanup. In October, Oneok told the state it had recovered 240,000 gallons of the liquid gas and cleanup continued.

Read more: https://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/underreporting-of-natural-gas-spill-by-k-gallons-raises-questions/article_a1a0543e-b882-53a5-b80c-74da2201fd57.html