Articles Posted in Energy and the Environment

In 2021 the Texas Legislature created the Texas Produced Water Consortium to study possible beneficial uses of fluid oil and gas wastes. The Consortium produced its report to the Legislature in 2022. I recently ran across a remarkable conclusion in that report: it estimates that in 2019 unconventional tight-oil formation wells in the Texas portion of the Permian Basin produced almost 4 billion barrels, or 506,800 acre-feet, of wastewater.  (click on image to enlarge)

506,800 acre-feet is a column of water covering an acre of land and 96 miles high. Or 11.6 square miles covered one foot deep in water. Lake Buchanan, the largest Texas lake, has a capacity of 992,000 acre-feet. New York City consumes 1,236,000 acre-feet of water per year.

It is no wonder that the underground injection of such a huge volume of water is causing problems. Much of that water is being injected into shallow oil-producing formations, in particular the depths of the Delaware Mountain Group, damaging producing wells and causing waste. The increased pressures in injection zones have caused abandoned wells to erupt in gushers of injected water. And water injection is inducing seismic events, otherwise known as earthquakes. The Railroad Commission has even ordered some injection wells to be shut down in response to those quakes.

This link shows a report from CBS Odessa affiliate about a huge leak of injected water. These events are occurring all over West Texas because the Railroad Commission grants permits to dispose of produced water into shallow formations. Thousands of old wellbores exist in West Texas, some never plugged, some plugged before regulation of wells, some plugged in violation of regulations. The over-pressurized formation breaks into the wellbore, or finds its way to the surface. Until the Commission addresses the problem by properly regulating produced water injection, these problems will only grow. (Click on image to enlarge)

A good article in Texas Tribune about the growing problem of P-13 wells that are leaking and contaminating land and groundwater.

When an oil and gas operator drills a dry hole or decides to abandon a well, instead of plugging the well it can transfer the well to the surface owner to re-complete as a water well. The parties file a Form P-13 with the Railroad Commission to accomplish that change in ownership. The Commission and the operator contend that the surface owner then becomes responsible for plugging the well. But apparently the law is not so clear on the issue. The Middle Pecos Groundwater District contends that some 40 P-13 wells in its area are the responsibility of the Railroad Commission to plug as orphan wells. The problem is exacerbated by operators using a shallow formation to dispose of produced water; the formation is pressured up and unplugged P-13 wells become a conduit for flowing polluted salt water to come up the wellbore.