No Big Surprises, Officials Indicate : Methane Gas Report Pinpoints Seepage Areas

When Kelly Stoetz and her family moved into their Broad Street apartment in Newport Beach about a year ago, the biggest concern she had about a nearby methane-burning lamppost was the odor.

Wednesday, after reading reports that she lives on top of a deposit of potentially dangerous methane gas, Stoetz said she and her family have new and greater concerns.

“It’s scary,” Stoetz said, but she added that she is resigned to the problem. “We can have an earthquake any day, too.”

A state study released Tuesday identified potentially explosive neighborhoods throughout Orange, Los Angeles and Ventura counties as the sites of underground pockets of methane gas. The study was prompted by an explosion last year at a Fairfax district discount department store in Los Angeles that injured 21 people. It occurred when gas leaked from the ground into an unventilated room.

The gas can accumulate because of bacterial activity within the soil and from decomposition that occurs around abandoned oil and gas wells, according to the report, which was conducted as a result of legislation introduced by state Sen. David A. Roberti (D-Los Angeles).

Three Areas in County

Three Orange County sites--Newport Beach, Huntington Beach and the Brea-Olinda oil fields--were pinpointed as possible hot spots for methane gas trouble, according to the report prepared by GeoScience Analytical Inc. of Simi Valley.

In Newport Beach, the highest concentrations of gas were measured near Broad Street and Holmwood Drive, near 43rd Street and Balboa Boulevard and near the Coves, a development along Coast Highway, said Fleet Rust, the president of GeoScience. Researchers checked for gas at 111 sites in the city and found seepages of varying concentrations at 38 spots.

Rust said the locations of gas seepages are “more diffused” in Huntington Beach, where workers checked 186 sites and found high concentrations of gas in about half. Among them, he said, are test sites near Algonquin Street and Heil Avenue, near Christine Drive and Susan Lane, near Saluda Circle and Landfall Drive, near the cul de sac of Hilaria Circle, under a vacant field near Brookhurst Street and Banning Avenue and in a park next to John H. Eader School.

About one-quarter of the 70 sites checked in the Brea-Olinda oil field area revealed high concentrations, but they are confined to the undeveloped hills owned by oil companies, according to the report.

Rust said residents in the trouble areas of Huntington Beach and Newport Beach can protect themselves by airing out closed-up quarters. Basements, especially, should be “ventilated on a continuing basis,” he said. If there is no basement, residents should make sure the garage door is opened every so often and that rooms are not shut up for long periods, he said.

Many Residents Aware

Many of the residents living in the areas tested by GeoScience are aware of the methane gas problem, Rust said.

“They know it exists,” he said. “Sometimes they see bubbles in the ground after it rains. . . . It isn’t coming as a surprise to many of them.”

Newport Beach resident Pat Eikerman, Stoetz’s neighbor, is well aware of the gas. A methane lamp in her front yard funnels the gas out of the ground into the air, where it is burned. She notices the gas, she said, only when the flame goes out, because the unburned vapor produces a foul odor.

A Huntington Beach fire official said the city has been long aware of the potential for methane gas problems caused by the area’s numerous abandoned oil wells. A quick reading of the GeoScience report revealed “fairly much what we suspected we would find,” Fire Marshal James Vincent said Wednesday.

Huntington Beach officials are awaiting action by the state on a plan to alleviate two methane seepages from leaking abandoned oil well casings, he said. In addition, there are controls on new construction in areas of abandoned oil wells. Building plans must first be approved by a geologist, and the builder must pour an impermeable slab and build vents in case there are leaks, Vincent said.

The GeoScience report endorsed the impermeable slabs for Huntington Beach. It also recommended that methane gas monitors and vents “may be economically feasible,” adding that the construction of vent wells should be a last resort because they are expensive and possibly not effective for the area.

‘Significant’ Concentrations

The Brea-Olinda oil field has “significant” concentrations of gas, which “could be potentially hazardous if they were subject to development,” the report said. “In fact, many of the higher gas concentrations (during the study) were accompanied by oil seepage, increasing the danger associated with any future development.”

William Kelly, Brea’s development services director, said city officials had not seen the report. The oil field is scheduled for low-density residential development eventually, according to the city’s general plan. But construction is a long way off, Kelly said. The property currently is used for oil production, and city officials have no idea if or when the oil companies plan to sell the property for other uses, he said. He could not comment on whether the study will prompt city officials to change the general plan.

Because the trouble spots in Newport Beach are in developed neighborhoods, the report states, “only after-the-fact mitigation measures can be taken,” including the installation of 24-hour methane monitors, coupled with “shallow-vent wells.”

Some Newport Beach residents near 36th Street said they have smelled methane gas in their neighborhood, but they said the odor was decreased by the city’s installation of a pipe about three stories high a few months ago. The pipe funnels the odor above homes.

“I didn’t realize it was so dangerous,” said Bill Davis, 24, upon learning of the hazard.