As promised I will post oilfield topics on Mondays however since Monday was a holiday I am posting the first in the series today, Tuesday this week.
I hear and see a lot of misconceptions regarding H2S, aka - stink damp, aka - swamp gas, aka - sour gas, aka - rotten eggs gas. it is known by a lot of nicknames however Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) is the actual name and composition. It gathers some of it's nicknames due to it's distinct odor it has at small concentrations. It is most commonly referred to as Sour Gas around here in Oklahoma.
If you have heard the term sweet well or sour well that it what it is referring to a sweet well is a "non" H2S well, although it more than likely does have some very minor H2S concentrations not enough to be considered "Sour" a sour well is a KNOWN H2S producing well or a known H2S source hence the name "sour" to also coincide with the sour odor of the gas.
While working on my Master's in Safety Engineering I have done some extensive research and had portions of a paper joint published with my professor, but instead of boring you with a ton of text and writings I really like these videos for basic awareness they have short clips and give a great overview of basic H2S awareness.
I hope this helps to answer some questions I know some of you have had as well as provide you much needed information on a topic that is a biggie in any oilfield setting.
Is H2S a scary thing...??? Well yes it can be if it isn't taken seriously and respected. The picture of myself on here is one of me on location and you see the black thing on my hard hat?
That is my PAM (Personal Alarm Monitor) it is a gas monitor that is to be worn within your breathing zone preferably 18" of since the main source of toxicity comes from inhalation with most any poisonous substance. Why is that??? Because we all have to breathe to survive and we don't have much control over that. Anyway back to my PAM, it needs to be worn on your outer most layer of clothing and like I said within your breathing zone and NO your breathing zone isn't the back of your hard hat even though I have seen several worn there! Now this is just a Personal monitor and not made to be utilized to take readings over large areas that is what multi-gas and fixed monitors are for (both shown in the video). Those PAM's are normally set to go off at 10ppm and by go off I mean by a loud, loud audible tone along with vibration and flashing lights, when they reach 15-20ppm it goes even crazier basically yelling at you to get the heck out of dodge! And so that is what you do you don't question it, you don't take a moment to look at the reading, you just hightail it out of the area. Because in that moment it takes you to question it or read the monitor might could just be the last moment you have alive. H2S concentrations can rise in just the blink of an eye.
Yes you can safely work around H2S as long as you have the correct Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) available. What is that you ask? You need to be in a air supplied respirator a such as a Self Contained Breathing Apparatus. Although not always ideal when performing heavy manual labor due to the limited amount of O2 available.
More commonly you will see Cascade Systems which consist of compressed air bottles interconnected to provide breathing air to the workers. The system is set up with a regulator to reduce the air pressure going to the work area. From a cascade system low pressure hoses(s) connect manifold(s) into which each worker can connect the hose line for his work-escape unit (breathing equipment).
There are also emergency escape packs if either of the above fail and those are small packs made just for what they say emergency escape and normally will provide around 10 min. of air so you can get out of your main air supply fails.
As highly toxic and lethal as it is you would think we in the oilfield would see more incidents with it huh? Well not really people both old oilfield and young oilfield have a respect for H2S and take the threat more seriously than most anything else they work with each and every day. It scares people because of the unknown and it can just really sneak up on you and I think the fear of it all is what causes the massive amount of respect for it. Plus the fact there are minimal survivors of overexposure to H2S to tell their stories and it is not been glamorized like so many other things in the oilfield (thank heavens). I only wish energy isolation (lock out tag out), confined space, working from heights and a few others I will touch on in the coming weeks and months could be looked as the same way we do as H2S and really take it as seriously.
'til tomorrow everyone have a wonderful & SAFE Tuesday Evening!
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