Stop Big Oil From Dumping Its Waste in Texas Rivers

Texas has an oil industry problem so enormous that companies are running out of places to put it.

Every day, oil and gas production in the Permian Basin generates roughly 1 billion gallons of toxic wastewater, known as “produced water.” For years, companies have pumped much of this waste underground. But all that injection has increased underground pressure and contributed to earthquakes, blowouts, and wastewater erupting back to the surface.

Now the industry wants another way out: treat the wastewater and release it into Texas rivers or spread it across the land.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is developing permits and rules that could allow treated produced water to be discharged into rivers or applied across Texas land.

But regulators should not turn Texas rivers and rangelands into the oil industry’s newest disposal system without compelling, independent evidence that the wastewater can be made safe.

Produced water can contain extremely high concentrations of salt along with hydrocarbons, drilling chemicals, ammonia, and naturally occurring radioactive materials. And cleaning it at the enormous scale required in the Permian could create another environmental problem: massive new energy demand.

Previous research found that treating wastewater produced in the Permian  Basin at scale could require 5 to 26 gigawatts of additional power, depending on treatment efficiency. To put that in perspective, that much continuous power is roughly equivalent to the electricity used by about 4 million to 22 million average American homes. That could mean more fossil-fuel generation and more climate pollution just to deal with the waste created by extracting still more fossil fuels.

The stakes go beyond wastewater disposal. The oil industry is looking for new ways to manage the enormous volume of toxic waste its drilling creates so it can keep extracting more fossil fuels from the Permian. Texas shouldn’t put its water, land, and climate at risk just to make continued oil production easier and more profitable.

Please sign the petition to tell TCEQ: Protect Texas water, land, and climate from the oil industry’s toxic waste.

The petition to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality reads: Do not approve widespread discharge or land application of treated oil and gas wastewater unless independent science demonstrates that it is safe for people, waterways, groundwater, wildlife, and ecosystems. Require rigorous testing, monitoring, transparency, and enforceable pollution limits, and fully consider the additional energy demand and climate pollution associated with wastewater treatment. Texas should not sacrifice its water, land, or climate simply to keep the Permian Basin pumping more oil.
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Source:

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/20082026/texas-oil-wastewater-treatment/