{"id":48396,"date":"2021-02-23T19:32:56","date_gmt":"2021-02-24T02:32:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/san-juan-basin-natural-gas-field-not-affected-by-texas-freeze\/"},"modified":"2021-02-24T02:32:56","modified_gmt":"2021-02-24T02:32:56","slug":"san-juan-basin-natural-gas-field-not-affected-by-texas-freeze","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/san-juan-basin-natural-gas-field-not-affected-by-texas-freeze\/","title":{"rendered":"San Juan Basin natural gas field not affected by Texas freeze"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Natural
Natural gas production and distribution in northern New Mexico and Southwest Colorado was not affected by winter weather in Texas because pipelines in this region don\u2019t run to the Lone Star State.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

As a winter freeze crippled energy production across Texas, some residents living in Southwest Colorado and northern New Mexico may be wondering if the slowdown had any impact on natural gas leaving the San Juan Basin.<\/p>\n

Christi Zeller, who heads the Energy Council, a Southwest Colorado oil and gas advocacy group, said that wasn\u2019t an issue, as natural gas from the region does not go to Texas.<\/p>\n

Zeller said the primary gas types in the San Juan Basin in Southwest Colorado and northern New Mexico are conventional gas (such as heavier hydrocarbon, like propane and butane) and coal-seam or coalbed methane gas.<\/p>\n

Most of the natural gas from San Juan Basin in New Mexico, Zeller said, is routed to the Ignacio plant, and then sent north to Seattle and areas around Washington. The plant in Bloomfield sends gas to California.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are no direct pipelines to Texas from San Juan Basin fields that I know of,\u201d Zeller said.<\/p>\n

One reason, Zeller said, is Texas doesn\u2019t need to import natural gas \u2013 the Lone Star state has plenty of it.<\/p>\n

Texas, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, leads the nation in natural gas production, accounting for one-fourth of U.S. gross withdrawals in 2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cNatural gas is shipped from Texas across the U.S. and into Mexico,\u201d the EIA reported. \u201cLarge volumes of natural gas also enter the state, primarily through Oklahoma, Louisiana and New Mexico, but more natural gas leaves the state than enters. Most of it continues on to Louisiana and Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n

The natural gas that is imported from New Mexico, Zeller said, is likely from the Permian Basin, which spans southeastern New Mexico and western Texas.<\/p>\n

According to the EIA report, Texas leads the nation in natural gas consumption, accounting for almost 15% of the U.S. total.<\/p>\n

\u201cMore than one-third of Texas households rely on natural gas as their primary heating fuel,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n

As temperatures dropped to record lows in Texas this month, residents there used more energy for heating, increasing demand at a time when the electricity grid\u2019s infrastructure was being compromised by the cold.<\/p>\n

Although the infrastructure for all forms of energy \u2013 natural gas, nuclear, wind \u2013 at least in part failed leading to the catastrophe, because Texas relies so heavily on natural gas, its system has fallen under scrutiny.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom frozen natural gas wells to frozen wind turbines, all sources of power generation have faced difficulties during the winter storm,\u201d the Texas Tribune<\/em> reported. \u201cBut Texans largely rely on natural gas for power and heat generation, especially during peak usage, experts said.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Feb. 16, an estimated 4.5 million people were without power, according to a report in the Tribune<\/em>, and the death toll may not be known for weeks or months.<\/p>\n

jromeo@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

region go to Northwest, California<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48397,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[221,28,477,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-48396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-gas-and-oil","tag-headlines","tag-natural-gas","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48396"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=48396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}