Making Better Choices for YOu and The Environment
The Preferred Method
Proper disposal of oil and gas production water is a priority for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Class II Saltwater Injections Wells are its preferred method.
Wellness for the Environment
Using Class II Saltwater Injection Wells helps the environment in many ways. Currently, western Pennsylvania is experiencing an excess supply of production water, a shortage of dormant wells, and a poor injection rate. This has forced Pennsylvania operators to truck their production water an average of 100 miles each way to Ohio.
Locating more saltwater injection wells in western Pennsylvania mitigates this problem.
An Environmentally Benign Solution
There are tens of thousands of oil and gas wells operating in Pennsylvania,
West Virginia, and Ohio. The number has increased dramatically over the past
several decades due to the introduction of fracking techniques to the region,
particularly on the gas side of the business.
Fracking requires an enormous amount of water, along with sand, to be sent
down a well under high pressure in order to fracture the geologic formation
and release the gas or oil. Once the well becomes operational, a significant
amount of water comes back up the well along with the gas or oil, including
both the water that had been sent down as well as water that already existed in
the geological formation. The latter water, generally high in salinity, is
referred to as “brine.”
Current environmental regulations prevent this “production water” or
wastewater from being discharged into existing bodies of freshwater, and in
many places, can no longer be put into operator-created collection basins.
Consequently, oil and gas operators adopted the practice of inserting the water
back into the ground (i.e., back into the formations from which much of it
came) by converting depleted wells into injection sites. Many operators use
their own depleted wells to dispose of their own production water. However,
with the surge in new well drilling in the past decade, due to the effectiveness
of fracking, the amount of production water being generated exceeds the
existing injection capacity involving dormant wells.
The combination of an enormous excess supply of production water and the shortage of high-quality reservoirs in depleted fields has forced Pennsylvania operators to truck their production water an average of 100 miles each way to Ohio.
Giving Back to the Community
PA Well Development (PAW) is committed to making a positive impact in the communities we work with. We give back to the communities in which we work, as well as to animal rescue organizations in western Pennsylvania.