It’s On. Delivering on Commitments and History-Making Initiatives.
Headquartered in Denver, CO, BKV Corporation is a company of innovators passionate about the energy industry changing the world. They are forward-thinking, growth-driven and relentless in their pursuit of delivering sustainable energy to the world. Since being founded in 2015, BKV has become one of the top 20 gas-weighted natural gas producers in the United States and the largest natural gas producer in the Barnett Shale.
This summer, BKV is releasing their 2023 Sustainability Report, detailing progress on the company’s environmental initiatives and path to achieving net zero, updates on employee engagement efforts as well as their tradition of excellence in safety performance.
BKV’s CEO, Chris Kalnin, spoke about the report, saying, “As you look through our third annual Sustainability Report, you’ll see how we live up to the high standards we set for ourselves on every page. Despite a downturn in commodity prices—perhaps in defiance of it—we continue to deliver on the commitments we make.”
While their core business is producing natural gas from their owned and operated upstream businesses, they aspire to maintain a "closed-loop" approach with their four primary business lines: natural gas upstream production, natural gas midstream, power generation and carbon capture, utilization and sequestration (CCUS).
This year’s report prominently features the success of the Pad of the Future program, which was launched in 2021. This program aims to streamline and enhance existing operations and pad-level designs to reduce direct emissions while maintaining operational continuity. Specifically, the initiative focuses on upgrading equipment identified as major sources of methane emissions, thereby reducing the overall greenhouse gas emissions from our upstream assets. These upgrades encompass a range of solutions, including pneumatic conversions, electrification, asset consolidation, modification of gas processing units and liquids consolidation and vapor capture.
"With approximately 3,200 wells completed, our methane-busting Pad of the Future is a triumph of today, eliminating estimated annual GHG emissions of approximately 520,000 metric tons per year of CO₂ equivalent (CO₂e)," said Kalnin about the program.
The Pad of the Future Program has eliminated over 18% of BKV's GHG emissions since the established baseline year of 2021. An additional 19% reduction was achieved through improving emission quantification methods and implementing site-level leak detection and repair programs. In total, this represents a 38% reduction from the 2021 baseline, which was re-established to include assets acquired in 2022, which represents an overall reduction of 0.9 Mtpy.
Another integral part of BKV’s sustainability initiatives is CCUS. This method captures CO₂ before it is released into the atmosphere. Then, it can be used directly or indirectly in various products (e.g., fertilizer) or, as with BKV’s current practice, permanently stored in deep underground geological formations.
In 2022, BKV began strategically leveraging resources towards building their CCUS business to deliver on their sustainability promise. In late 2023, they launched their Barnett Zero facility, a purpose-drilled, Class II commercial carbon sequestration well in north Texas, promising to help offset carbon emissions from their local natural gas production operations. This facility permanently sequesters CO₂ waste from a nearby natural gas processing plant that processes much of their natural gas. BKV is among the first companies to execute a commercial carbon capture and sequestration operation in the country, paired with a monitoring, reporting and verifying (MRV) plan approved by the United States EPA. In addition, they are working on their next facility already and have over a dozen additional CCUS projects in the pipeline, showcasing their commitment to CCUS business development.
BKV is building upon its CCUS strategy with the introduction of its new product, Carbon Sequestered Gas (CSG). This first-of-its-kind carbon-neutral natural gas is developed with quantifiable, blockchain-verifiable carbon credits. Kalnin elaborated on CSG’s significance, stating, “CSG is the energy transition catalyst that’ll provide companies a faster, straighter path to sustainability. It’s designed to help customers achieve their net-zero targets at any scale. This isn’t something they have to wait for, either. CSG is available right now.”
Emissions reduction efforts aren’t the only highlights in BKV’s robust list of initiatives focused
on mitigating environmental impacts and creating a spot for the natural gas industry in a
sustainable energy future. Read about water management efforts, spill prevention and
asset integrity and many more in the full report.
Sustainability isn't just a goal for BKV’s environmental impact; they aim for it in all aspects of their business. They would rather go above and beyond with their guiding principles, hoping it’ll help push them to reach new heights.
And what are those guiding principles? "Operational and safety excellence, maintaining and exceeding regulatory requirements, strong business ethics and care for our people, and being a force for good in society. These principles are central to every decision we make," said Kalnin.
This values-led culture extends to the way they engage with their employees and communities, as well. With an enhanced user interface experience, BKV has driven more employee engagement in career advancement and planning, revitalized the training program to offer more hands-on experiences for employees and is offering regular frontline leadership training courses and mentorship opportunities. They've also invested $170k in local nonprofits in communities across Denver, Texas and Pennsylvania. BKV is committed to serving as a social leader in communities where they operate, and they have grown their employee volunteerism and community investment programs to live out this commitment.
"BKV is steadfast in their efforts toward social progress, making advances in numerous health and safety initiatives, like revitalizing our Safety Committee to have our frontline workers serve as its members so we can drive real, impactful change and building collaborative relationships with local first responders. Additionally, we maintained our workforce TRIR below 0.5 and had zero Tier 1 incidents, again in 2023, demonstrating that our commitments have paid off," said Kalnin about BKV's dedication.
Although they've already done so much, BKV doesn't plan to stop anytime soon. They plan on staying one step ahead with sustainability in mind. It’s on.
Read all the details in BKV's 2023 Sustainability Report at bkv.com.
