Source: Forbes. As detailed in a new report from Rice University’s Baker Institute, the language would reclassify returned water from oilfield drilling operations as a “hazardous waste” under the provisions of the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). From the Baker Institute report:
Section 625 of the act holds particular importance, as it would task the administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) with determining whether certain oil and gas production byproducts—including produced water—“meet the criteria promulgated under this section for the identification or listing of hazardous waste” within one year of the bill’s enactment.3 The EPA defines produced water as “the water (brine) brought up from the hydrocarbon-bearing strata during the extraction of oil and gas.”
Such a change could do great harm to the upstream industry’s ability to get its business done. This brine – which is basically all that’s left once any solids have been removed from the returned water – has always been disposed of in Class II disposal wells, which exist in the tens of thousands across the country. Such wells are regulated by state agencies like the North Dakota Industrial Commission, the Oklahoma Corporation Commission and the Texas Railroad Commission.
But this reclassification would require the water to be disposed of in Class I wells governed by the U.S. EPA and its delegees, like the Texas Council on Environmental Quality. As the Baker Institute points out, only a few hundred such wells exist in isolated pockets currently, most along the Gulf Coasts of Texas and Louisiana.
If your goal is to damage the U.S. domestic oil and gas industry, this is a fairly ingenious approach. As the report’s authors point out, the language in the bill envisions a short timeline for implementation that would afford the industry little time to adjust. One industry executive I contacted said the change would be “potentially disastrous” for the business.
UNIVERSAL IMAGES GROUP VIA GETTY IMAGES
While it all sounds quite dire, one elected official in Texas is not so sure. Given his background in the waste disposal business and his current status as one of the state’s three members of the Railroad Commission, I contacted Jim Wright to get his thoughts on the subject. Though he acknowledged the seriousness of this proposed change, he was a little more sanguine about the industry’s ability to cope with anything that comes down from Washington over the next few years.
“I think we are in for a crazy four years. There is going to be a lot of stuff thrown at the wall – what sticks, I’m not real sure,” he said. “If this does come to reality in whatever fashion, I think that our industry will adapt.” Not an unreasonable presumption given the industry’s long history of successfully adapting to a constantly changing regulatory environment.
Wright pointed out that advances in technology in this century have enable the industry to create uses for the returned water that are viable and scalable. He focused on two in particular: “One is for re-fracking, and the second is to utilize it for irrigation. We have seen a lot of development of technology related to both,” he said. “We are going to be looking very hard at trying to simplify the process of encouraging recycling of that water.”
Wright also said that the best way to prevent returned water from being classified as a waste product is to not allow it to become a waste in the first place. “One thing I think people miss the boat on is the fact that waste is not a waste until it’s a waste,” he said. “If you’re going to recycle something, that’s not a waste. You are actually utilizing a product. So, when they talk about reclassifying this water as a hazardous waste, perhaps the best response to that is not to let it become a waste.”
This is just one more piece of the overall effort by the anti-fossil fuel community to exert federal control over the oilfield in states, like Texas, that don’t have much federal lands within them. It’s certainly a matter the industry must take seriously. But at the end of the day, should it become law, proponents of this language will likely end up disappointed by the level of damage they’ve been able to inflict with it.
David Blackmon is an independent energy analyst/consultant based in Mansfield, TX. He is the Editor of Shale Magazine and co-host of In The Oil Patch Radio,
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