It could be argued the Permian Basin is a water play with a side of hydrocarbons. While oil is the goal, all that water represents a significant waste stream.
Unconventional shale operators fairly quickly started diverting some produced water to hydraulic fracturing, but that still left vast volumes of water to be dealt with. Disposal wells—a favored and economical option—raise a number of potential issues, including induced seismicity. Treatment for reuse faces its own challenges, as does the idea of turning the waste stream into a feedstock for mineral extraction.
At the recent Unconventional Resources Technology Conference (URTeC) in Houston, industry experts discussed the problem of produced water, examined the options for dealing with it, presented zero-discharge efforts, and suggested ways to reduce the volume of produced water in the first place.
Danny Kingham, principal hydrogeologist at GSI Environmental, noted to a lunchtime URTeC audience that Texas is the largest producer of crude oil, natural gas, and water.
