Need to return call by / at/between and

. Signature:

___________________________ Project No.: 0172.09. 038.082 Page 1 of 2

Project Name: Shale Gas 

### CBI?

Yes

No TELEPHONE CALL RECOR D Incoming Outgoing Date: 9/26/2011 Time: 3:5 0 am

pm

Company Name: Global Petroleum Research Institute (GPRI) ERG Staff Name: Sarah Hays

Contact Name: David Burnett Contact Phone

Number: 979

- 845

- 2274

General Subject: GPRI Reverse Osmosis Research



### TOPICS DISCUSSED AND ACTION TAKEN

On September 26, 2011 at 3:50pm I called David Burnett, the director of technology at the Global Petroleum Research Institute (GPRI) and let a message.

On September 27, 2011 at 9:00am David Burnett returned my phone call. We spoke for nearly an hour about the following topics. Burnett has been on the EPA Advisory Committee and was currently attending a fracturing workshop at the University of Wyoming (UW) in Laramie, WY , which was free, open to the public and a two

day event (September 26

- 27, 2011)

. See: http://www.uwyo.edu/ser/conferences/index.html

.

Burnett first started to provide me with references I could look into (A rgonne National Lab

– John Veil). I told

him we had looked into these references. He also mentioned Stewart Environmental Consultants (Dave Stewart)

as a technical reference.

Burnett was very knowledgeable about thermal distillation and I think has tested thermal technology usage as well as reverse osmosis. He commented that thermal treatments are efficient and when you have 15 to 20 percent total dissolved solids (TDS) in wastewater, thermal techniques are good at reducing the volume of

solids in the waste water.

Burnett has been testing pretreatment options to use with reverse osmosis treatment. Burnett focused primarily

on media filtration pretreatment, using membranes (microfilters, etc.) because they are good for reuse and can be used to treat specific c ontaminants found in different produced water. He has used filters to remove hydrocarbons, scaling contaminants, and suspended solids. He commented that microfilters are very efficient at solids removal, which is his main focus.

Burnett said there are more than 20,000 membrane options , and the biggest consideration for him right now is that they are commercially available. The main vendors he uses for membranes are: DOW, Hydronautics, and GE. Important characteristics are that they can operate at a low pres sure and have high removal efficiencies as well as being chemically robust. He said that temperature variation is not a big issue with membranes.

Burnett commented briefly on membrane fouling . He uses microcapillary hollow filters (Zenon Environmental

tech nology that GE bought) which have a downfall of having a high physical footprint (large surface areas)

. However, they can handle up to 40 MGD and don’t foul for years. They are able to separate solids from water using pressure differences. Municipal water treatment is starting to use this technology. Burnett is working on cleaning techniques for these membranes. Typically, Burnett says membranes can last approximately 1 year without fouling. This is another point of research for him: developing membranes/op tions that last longer than 1 year. He estimated that the hollow fibers treat 2 gallons/minute and cost $1

, 000. He then went on to say that it

would be a capital investment of approximately $1,000,000 per 1000 gallons of treated water, and that operating costs are low.Need to return call by / at/between and

. Signature:

___________________________ Burnett discussed alternative energy options available for RO treatment units. He said that mobile power sources, such as microturbines (which require low grade gas), solar panels (if system has low pressure requirements), and wind turbines (studied by Texas A&M’s Center for Applied Technology), are viable for powering pretreatment units. The osmotic pressure required by RO is too high for using these alternative energy options unless there is excess power or an additional power source. Burne tt said that Texas A&M developed a wind turbine unit that is mobile and can provide 50 Amps of current , which is not enough to run an RO unit, but is enough for him to power media filters for pretreatment

, which are capable of removing hydrocarbons. Burnett expects that over the next five years, this research will continue and a more viable alternative energy option for

mobile units will be available, but that it is still in research stages.

Burnett said he could release some of the information about his studies/trials in the Eagle Ford shale as well as the Marcellus shale after talking to his operators and getting them to approve the information release.

Burnett is currently working for the Department of Energy in New York

, and one of the first oil and gas operations working in the Marcellus in N ew Y ork . He directed me to the Marcellus Shale Coalition as an additional reference and to an unreleased report which provided flowback data for 17 companies opera ting in the Marcellus Shale. ( see NYDEC document; Leff, 2011) . He stated that he did not think RO would be a viable option in N ew Y ork , and it was implied that this was because of the quality of the flowback water

.

Burnett listed several thermal and revers e osmosis treatment technology vendors in the field: Altela, Fountain Quail, Siemens, University of Pittsburgh studies, and his own work.

Burnett discussed acid mine drainage, municipal wastewater, and industrial wastewater as potential water types
that co uld be treated using an RO system. Burnett also said that these water types were viable options for reuse

as frac turing water

.

Burnett talked briefly about freeze

- thaw evaporation (FTE) and the potential use for it in cold weather locations (i.e.: Wyoming , Canada, and North Dakota). He gave me a contact who would be helpful to talk to for more information about FTE (Lee Shafer at Integrity Production Services).

Burnett gave an example about treating brackish groundwater using RO treatment in order to produ ce drinking water in areas of Texas (Laredo, TX was his example) where there is a drought and they don’t have any drinking water. He then went on to say the waste stream from this RO treatment would be a viable option for fracturing water, however EPA says this waste must go to underground injection.