Business is booming for Ross and Tara Oakland after the couple opened Oaks Disposal Services in June 2013, making it the first landfill of its kind in Montana.
Oaks Disposal Services is capable of disposing oilfield waste generated during the drilling and production process.
“We’re accepting drill cuttings, contaminated soils from oil spills and saltwater spills, frac sand and oil sludge that has solidified,” says Ross Oakland.
The landfill, located near Lindsay, Mont., is about 40 miles west of the North Dakota border. The facility is able to dispose of material containing NORM (naturally occurring radioactive material).
“We are disposing of waste that has NORM levels too high for other facilities in the area to accept other than Colorado or Idaho,” Oakland says. This has led to many companies bringing material previously sent to Colorado to the facility.
Oakland says being able to accept NORM has been the key to the success of his business and the reason why his phone hasn’t stopped ringing since the facility opened.
Having an idea
Oakland got the idea for starting Oaks Disposal Services about two years ago while watching a drilling operation adjacent to his Montana property for several days.
“There was a drilling rig drilling right next to my land and they had to build a road going in there, so they went through my property. I got to talking to the drilling superintendent and he said if he were me he’d build a landfill,” Oakland said. “I didn’t want to get into the junk business, but then he told me that they have to bring their drill cuttings to a landfill. I got the idea from him and started the procedure that day. I went home and made some phone calls and started researching it.”
To complete the facility, Oakland had to invest roughly $5 million and spend two years working with his consultants and engineering teams wade through the permitting paperwork required by the Montana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ).
“It was a huge undertaking. They go through everything. There is an extensive review process to make sure you are able to do this financially, and mentally and you just have to be on top of your game,” Oakland says. “I’m so happy we did this because now it is an environmentally safe facility.”
Designing the facility was Oakland’s engineer Barry Damschen.
“Our facility has two liners in it, a leaching system and a stormwater detention pond,” Oakland said. Northwest Linings and Geotextile Products Inc. – based in Kent, Wash. – supplied and installed the liners for the facility.
Oakland devoted 130 acres to the facility. The lined portion is 23 acres and features a Geosynthetic clay liner, 60-mil textured HDPE liner, a geocomposite layer, a 16 ounce non-woven geotextile layer and several levels of gravel.
Looking to the future
Oaks Disposal Services has capacity to last about 14 years or until reaching 2 million tons of waste. Each truck that comes into the landfill typically averages 25 tons.
Oakland says they’ll accept the waste from anywhere as long as it meets his criteria of 5 percent hydrocarbons or less and NORM containing 30 pCi/gm of Radium 226 and 228 or less.
“We’re able to take it from anywhere, even Canada if they want to bring it down,” he says. “There’s getting to be more and more oil production and the wells are starting to get older now, so we’re seeing more waste coming in from those. We’re the key facility for that.”
