This project centers around the Strategic Petroleum Site (SPR) known as the West Hackberry salt dome which located in southwestern Louisiana, and which is designed to store 241 million barrels of crude oil. Oil storage caverns are formed by injecting water into salt deposits, and pumping out the resulting brine. Studies described in this report were designed as follow-on studies to three months of pre-discharge characterization work, and include data collected during the first year of brine leaching operations. The objectives were to: (1) characterize the environment in terms of physical, chemical and biological attributes; (2) determine if significant adverse changes in ecosystem productivity and stability of the biological community are occurring as a result of brine discharge; and (3) determine the magnitude of any change observed. Volume V contains appendices for the following: supporting data for estuarine hydrology and hydrography; supporting data analysis of discharge plume; supporting data for water and sediment chemistry; CTD/DO and pH profiles during biological monitoring; supporting data for nekton; and supporting data for data management.

This project centers around the Strategic Petroleum Site (SPR) known as the West Hackberry salt dome which is located in southwestern Louisiana, and which is designed to store 241 million barrels of crude oil. Oil storage caverns are formed by injecting water into salt deposits, and pumping out the resulting brine. Studies described in this report were designed as follow-on studies to three months of pre-discharge characterization work, and include data collected during the first year of brine leaching operations. The objectives were to: (1) characterize the environment in terms of physical, chemical and biological attributes; (2) determine if significant adverse changes in ecosystem productivity and stability of the biological community are occurring as a result of brine discharge; and (3) determine the magnitude of any change observed. Contents of Volume II include: introduction; physical oceanography; estuarine hydrology and hydrography; analysis of discharge plume; and water and sediment quality.

This project centers around the Strategic Petroleum Site (SPR) known as the West Hackberry salt dome which is located in southwestern Louisiana and which is designed to store 241 million barrels of crude oil. Oil storage caverns are formed by injecting water into salt deposits, and pumping out the resulting brine. Studies described in this report were designed as follow-on studies to three months of pre-discharge characterization work, and include data collected during the first year of brine leaching operations. The objectives were to: (1) characterize the environment in terms of physical, chemical and biological attributes; (2) determine if significant adverse changes in ecosystem productivity and stability of the biological community are occurring as a result of brine discharge; and (3) determine the magnitude of any change observed. Volume IV contains the following: bibliography; appendices for supporting data for physical oceanography, and summary of the physical oceanography along the western Louisiana coast.

The physical, chemical and biological attributes are described for: (1) a coastal marine environment centered about a Department of Energy Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) brine disposal site located 11.4 km off the southwest coast of Louisiana; and (2) the lower Calcasieu and Sabine estuarine systems that provide leach waters for the SPR project. During the study period, the daily discharge averaged 529,000 barrels of 216 0/00 brine, representing a loading of 18,000 metric tons of salt per day. The objective of this study are: (1) characterize the environment in terms of physical, chemical and biological attributes; (2) determine if significant adverse changes in ecosystem productivity and stability of the biological community are occurring as a result of brine discharge; and (3) determine the magnitude of any change observed. This report describes the methodology and significant results of the first year's monitoring effort of the West Hackberry brine disposal site. The investigative tasks, presented as separate sections, are: Physical Oceanography, Estuarine Hydrology and Hydrography, Analysis of Discharge Plume, Water and Sediment Quality, Special Pollutant Surveys, Benthos, Nekton, Phytoplankton, Zooplankton and Data Management.

Commercial and centralized drilling-fluid disposal (CCDD) sites receive a portion of spent drilling fluids for disposal from oil and gas exploration and production (E&P) operations. Many older and some abandoned sites may have operated under less stringent regulations than are currently enforced. This study provides a census, compilation, and summary of information on active, inactive, and abandoned CCDD sites in Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas, intended as a basis for supporting State-funded assessment and remediation of abandoned sites. Closure of abandoned CCDD sites is within the jurisdiction of State regulatory agencies. Sources of data used in this study on abandoned CCDD sites mainly are permit files at State regulatory agencies. Active and inactive sites were included because data on abandoned sites are sparse. Onsite reserve pits at individual wells for disposal of spent drilling fluid are not part of this study. Of 287 CCDD sites in the four States for which we compiled data, 34 had been abandoned whereas 54 were active and 199 were inactive as of January 2002. Most were disposal-pit facilities; five percent were land treatment facilities. A typical disposal-pit facility has fewer than 3 disposal pits or cells, which have a median size of approximately …

This document highlights the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy's investments and impacts in the state of Louisiana.

This 2003 Spring Semi-Annual Report contains a summary of the Final Technical Report being prepared for the Soil Remediation Requirements at Commercial and Centralized Drilling-Fluid Disposal (CCDD) Sites project funded by the United States Department of Energy under DOE Award No. DE-AC26-99BC15225. The summary describes (1) the objectives of the investigation, (2) a rationale and methodology of the investigation, (3) sources of data, assessment of data quality, and data availability, (4) examples of well documented centralized and commercial drilling-fluid disposal (CCDD) sites and other sites where drilling fluid was disposed of, and (5) examples of abandoned sites and measures undertaken for their assessment and remediation. The report also includes most of the figures, tables, and appendices that will be included in the final report.