Abstract
Hydraulic fracturing—the injection of pressurized fluid, often water, to increase recovery of oil or gas—has become increasingly popular in combination with horizontal drilling. Hydraulic fracturing improves production from a well, but requires a significant amount of water to do so and could put pressure on existing water resources, especially in water-stressed areas. To supply water needs, some water rights holders sell or lease their water resources to oil and gas producers in an informal water market. These transactions enable the opportunity for cross-sectoral investments, by which the energy sector either directly or indirectly provides the capital for water efficiency improvements in the agricultural sector as a mechanism to increase water availability for other purposes, including oil and gas production. In this analysis, we employ an original water and cost model to evaluate the water market in Texas and the potential for cross-sectoral collaboration on water efficiency improvements through a case study of the Lower Rio Grande Valley in Texas. We find that, if irrigation efficiency management practices were fully implemented, between 420 and 800 million m3 of water could be spared per year over a ten year period, potentially enabling freshwater use in oil and gas production for up to 26,000 wells, while maintaining agricultural productivity and possibly improving water flows to the ecosystem.
Highlights
Dwindling water supplies, change in climate, and increased demand on resources due to population and industry growth have led to increased water stress worldwide [1]
This study focuses on application of Best Management Practices (BMPs)
Texas’ water water market, market, itit is is important important to to keep keep transaction transaction costs costs in in mind mind as as they they might might create a significant barrier to market allocation of water resources and might cause implementation create a significant barrier to market allocation of water resources and might cause implementation to to lag lag [69]
Summary
Change in climate, and increased demand on resources due to population and industry growth have led to increased water stress worldwide [1]. Because oil and gas companies have significant capital invest, because they require largebrackish, quantitiessaline, of water fracture wells, This paper does nottoexplore possibilities for using ortoreuse water forand hydraulic because they are willing to pay a higher price for water than water purchasers in other sectors, they fracturing, rather it examines the hypothesis that freshwater savings enabled by improving irrigation can stimulate the water market, altering the current allocation of water and the implementation of efficiency in the agriculture sector would make significant volumes of water available for other management practices used for efficiency, reuse, or recycling. Hypothesize that if the energy cross-sectoral in water-efficient it uses significant volumes of water for a small overall portion of economic activity, and often has irrigation systems for agriculture, water could be made available for oil and gas production, potentially outdated, inefficient equipment. Maximum and median levels are calculated for 1990–2014 [5]
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