Parched Texans impose water-use limits for fracking gas wells

By Mike Lee; Editors: Susan Warren, Joe Winski
6 October 2011 Sept. 30 (Bloomberg) – An intensifying drought in Texas is prompting limits on water consumption that for the first time target oil and natural gas producers. Local water districts, which have authority to allocate water from subterranean aquifers, are adding a water-intensive production method called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, to some of the pumping restrictions they’re imposing on farmers and small towns. The city of Grand Prairie in the Barnett Shale in North Texas in August became the first municipality to ban the use of city water for fracking. Water officials for the Ogallala Aquifer in part of the Permian Basin included fracking when they approved the district’s first-ever restrictions on water use in July. Even before the drought, water was a sensitive issue for gas producers, who now use fracking to develop about 85 percent of the wells drilled in Texas, according to state regulators. “The rumblings have definitely started in the last six months,” said Chris Faulkner, chief executive officer of Breitling Oil and Gas Corp., a closely held producer in Irving, Texas. “It used to be, ‘Are you going to contaminate my water;’ now the concern is, ‘You’re going to use up all my water.’” […] The Texas restrictions represent a policy shift in a state that produces about one-fifth of the crude and one-third of the gas in the U.S., and is known for industry-friendly government. Landowners historically have been allowed to pump as much water as they want, and the energy industry has been exempt from many water conservation rules, said Ben Sebree, vice president for government affairs of the Texas Oil & Gas Association. “We’re really entering a new era of water management and water policy in the state,” Sebree said. […] Devon Energy Corp. has been using portable distilling plants since about 2007 to recycle water in the Barnett Shale and has a goal of recycling a third of the water it uses in the Granite Wash field in North Texas, said Tony Thornton, a spokesman for Oklahoma City-based Devon. “We can tell, more and more, water use is going to be an issue,” Thornton said in a telephone interview. […] In the Eagle Ford Shale formation in South Texas, oil and gas companies are forecast to increase water consumption to 44,800 acre-feet of water in 2020, up from 5,800 in 2010, according to a study by the University of Texas’ Bureau of Economic Geology. An acre-foot is about 325,000 gallons, enough to supply three average households for a year. Water use in the Barnett Shale is projected to increase to 40,300 acre-feet from 27,900 during the same period, the study said. The drought, which caused the state’s driest year since record keeping began in 1895, is expected to continue into 2012, said John Nielsen-Gammon, the state climatologist. […] Janet Guthrie, general manager of the Hemphill County Underground Water Conservation District in North Texas, said she may need to impose water limits for fracking if the water table drops too low. At that point, “The question is, how quick do you want to go dry?” she said.

Parched Texans Impose Water-Use Limits for Fracking Gas Wells