From the American Chemical Society
How to avoid water wars between ‘fracking’ industry and residents
The shale gas boom has transformed the energy landscape in the U.S., but in some drier locations, it could cause conflict among the energy industry, residents and agricultural interests over already-scarce water resources, say researchers. They add that degraded water quality is a potential risk unless there are adequate safeguards. The feature article appears in the ACS journal Environmental Science & Technology.
Meagan S. Mauter and colleagues point out that a major criticism of extracting shale gas through hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” is that it requires tremendous amounts of water — 2.5 to 5 million gallons — to develop a single well. Water, along with chemicals and sand, is injected under high pressure into wells to create cracks, or fractures, in shale and release stored gas. In some water-rich places, such as Pennsylvania, this is not a significant problem. But in other locations, including some rural counties in arid south Texas, this level of water use competes with residential and agricultural needs and depletes groundwater resources. These and other types of region-specific scenarios are similar to what other states and countries could encounter when or if they also develop shale gas reserves. Mauter’s team looked at what practices could help maintain a balance between fracking and environmental and residential needs.
The researchers say that there are ways to minimize the industry’s water footprint. One method is to use brackish water that is not fit for drinking or agricultural use but can be suitable for fracking. The other method is to recycle the waste water. “Leadership from both industry and the U.S. government may be needed to assure that economic benefits of shale gas development are realized without significant regional impairment of water resource quantity and quality,” the authors conclude.
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The headline does not seem to match the article. Water use management is extremely important for the future of fracking. This article does not seem to be foolish.
Funny, I thought most of the water & chemicals were recovered anyway, according to some pro-fracking websites! Have I got this wrong?
I work with water and waste water, so perhaps my perspective is skewed, but 5,000,000 gallons per well does not seem to be a “tremendous” amount of water, or an amount that is unmanageable.
When I went on a tour of Halliburton facility, they were very proud of the fact that they recycle as much of their frack water as possible. I think the petroleum industry may be ahead of the American Chemical Society on this one.
In water-poor counties, such as where much of the Eagle Ford Shale is being drilled, it is a lot of water, relatively speaking. And it would be a great shame to deplete fresh water reservoirs which take a significant number of years to recharge.
However, there are typically deeper water zones available in these areas which have salinity levels that make them non-potable. The frack companies prefer not to use them because it’s easier to calibrate the mixture when you start with pure fresh water, but it can be done.
In essence, this is an engineering and cost problem, but not a supply problem. It can be dealt with while still protecting relatively scarce fresh water resources.
It is all in where you put your priorities
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/04/21/idiots-on-parade-portand-water-bureaus-tenuous-grasp-of-science/
5m gallons of water in a dry county might seem a lot, but when taken in context of agricultural and residantal use it isn’t a lot. Even in the dry counties its agriculture that strains the use of water, not fracking. There are more farms and they use way more water than the wells.
An interesting article on solar energy vs fracking gas electrical generation cross over points.
April 6, 2013, based upon a Chase
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/04/04/Fracking-Could-Be-the-Key-to-a-Renewable-Energy-Future
This has a couple of graphs that are worth keeping on hand.
Solar energy cost (by region of the country) vs time (out to 2020) and competition with natural gas prices.
Also some illustration of the issues of electrical demand and sources over the course of a day under three scenarios.
Timely post ’cause of today’s news:
http://www.myfoxdfw.com/story/25325988/wise-county-family-awarded-3m-in-fracking-lawsuit
Solar power using polycrystalline silicon PV sounds wonderful for CO2 emissions, until you take into account the CO2 emitted in the production of the original silicon, and the service life of the PV cells. Then the balance becomes very unfavorable. If you want to reduce CO2 emissions to the atmosphere, silicon cells are not the way to go.
Texas is a little ahead of the American Chemical Society …
RAILROAD COMMISSION OF TEXAS
NEWS RELEASE – MARCH 26, 2013
http://www.rrc.state.tx.us/pressreleases/2013/032613.php
How much is five million gallons? It is in the eye of the beholder. That is about 15 acre-feet, a rounding error for some flood control projects. At $10 per acre-foot for raw water, that is pocket change (http://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1419&context=jcwre)
At $582 per acre foot, that is less than $9,000 (http://www.mwdh2o.com/mwdh2o/pages/news/press_releases/2014-04/Budget_Rates_Adopted.pdf)
Five million gallons is also about 6,700 ccf (hundred cubic feet) and according to my water billing rate, that is about $6,100 for more than ten years worth of water. From an activist point of view, 5 million gallons is 19 million liters or more than 133 million Canadian gills. Conversion to miner’s inches or Zanja-hours is left to the student.
Another contextual comparison can be the domed potable water storage tanks used by municipalities. They are known as “ground storage tanks”. Many of them are between 3 and 5 million gallons. Elevated tanks are about a half million.
The City of Dallas, Texas has the capacity to treat, for potable use, around 600,000,000 gallons per day across about a dozen facilities. I, once upon a time, worked at a treatment facility that was rated at 50,000,000 gpd. Relatively speaking, it was a “large” facility compared to the myriad little municipal facilities that treat less than 100,000 gpd.
50,000,000/1440 = 34,722 gallons per minute
5,000,000/1440 = 3,472 gallons per minute used to frac a well if it takes 24 hours to do it. That’s a hell of a lot of reverse osmosis membranes, and thousands of horsepower to develop the pressure to treat the wastewater. Even the BW (brackish water) and SW membranes designed for that sort of treatment have a very short lifespan in that environment.
A one inch rain falling on an acre will yield 43,560 gallons.
For perspective, 5,000,000 gallons is about 25,000 cubic yards.
Imagine a pool the size of one football field and 15 feet deep.
Imagine the runoff from a square mile of urban jungle (rooftops, sidewalks, streets) of 7.3 mm (0.28 inch) of rain.
“2.5 to 5 million gallons — to develop a single well”
Okay, compare that to water usage at the recently opened Ivanpah Solar Plant. Estimates are 100 acre-feet/year to keep the heliostats clean. An acre-foot of water is ~326,000 gallons. So every year 32,600,000 gallons are needed to be pumped from wells in this desert environment. It will be interesting to see how accurate these estimates are. Who knows, it may take more water to clean off the birds that crash into the mirrors after being scorched by flight through the concentrated solar flux.
Actually PRD there are around 27,000 gallons in 1 acre-inch.
So, in a few years when ocean levels start to recede and the question is asked:
Where did the water go?
The answer:
We Fracked it!
And why do we need fracking??? Its not just one well its the hundreds of wells drawing from the aquifer… The idea that the oil companies leave everything nice and shiny is not supported by their actions…
https://www.youtube.com/user/ColdFusionNow/videos
brantc: “And why do we need fracking???”
To get at the oil and natural gas.
Neil Jordan,
Can we get furlongs per fortnight in there somewhere?
brantc says:
April 24, 2014 at 10:29 am
If you really want to impress people with the progress made in Low Energy Nuclear Reactions, you should point them to the paper on the reactor from Japan which has run in excess of 880 hours, generating ~108 MJ of energy. Pointers to pages of YouTube videos aren’t helpful.
http://lenr-canr.org/index/DownloadOnly/DownloadOnly.php
2014-3-27 Yoshino, H., E. Igari, and T. Mizuno, Replicable Model for Controlled Nuclear Reaction using Metal Nanoparticles (PowerPoint slides), in The 2014 Cold Fusion [LANR] Colloquium at MIT. 2014: MIT.
Don’t worry, it is in the economic interest of oil & gas developers to minimize costs and conserve resources. I’ve worked in this field for 25+ years.
At the Pinedale Anticline in WY, we treated produced waters to a very high degree in merchant wastewater treatment plants. There are recoverable hydrocarbons in them thar waters, and we want it.
Also, new fracking technologies using substances besides water are gaining ground. Propane is being used, and compressed carbon dioxide will be ideal. There is a disconnect between major utility carbon dioxide generators and the shale plays, which tend to be remote. However, rest assured, all technical barriers will be surmounted. I’ve always said that the value of fossil fuel carbon dioxide is vast, and eventually this will be a resource that folks will fight to have access to.
See this article about waterless fracking: http://www.technologyreview.com/news/512656/skipping-the-water-in-fracking/
Speed says:
April 24, 2014 at 9:26 am
Texas is a little ahead of the American Chemical Society …
yes, ’cause sometimes we need less regulation….what a concept!
Lyle says:
April 24, 2014 at 10:28 am
So, in a few years when ocean levels start to recede and the question is asked:
Where did the water go?
The answer:
We Fracked it!
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Nope. Magma swallowed it. (see previous thread) 😊
Brackish and recycled water will eventually be the solution. And on top of that, they both have the trait of being green.