Oil, gas industry taps more water

Drillers have identified using almost three times as many rivers, streams and ponds for water sources in the first two months of this year than during the same period in 2012 and all of 2011. It’s a sign that energy extraction in Ohio is progressing, but it’s also a troubling development for environmental advocates who worry about the removal of water from its natural cycle.

There were 29 surface water withdrawal facilities for the end use of hydraulic fracturing, sometimes called “fracking,” in a preliminary count of registrations with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources in January and February, compared to 10 during the same period in 2012. The final count for 2012 was 128 facilities, compared to 11 in 2011.

Fracking involves blasting millions of gallons of water, combined with chemicals and proppants such as sand, underground at high pressure to release trapped oil and natural gas. The Utica Shale is an impermeable rock layer about one mile under most of eastern Ohio that, the oil and gas industry says, could not be economically mined before recent breakthroughs in fracking and horizontal drilling techniques.

The registration data doesn’t say how much water has been withdrawn from any of the wells. A spokeswoman for the natural resources department said that information won’t be finalized until the fall.

Ohio law requires the owner of any facility, which generally just means an industrial-strength pump in the case of mineral extraction, to register with the state if it has the ability to withdraw more than 100,000 gallons of water per day.

Before 2011, it was rare in Ohio to pump water from streams or lakes for use in fracking at this scale. The natural resources department only has four registrations for that purpose that are older than three years.

The facilities registered in January and February have a combined intake capacity of 45.3 million gallons per day. The typical horizontal shale well requires 5 million gallons of water to complete, according to Chesapeake Energy, which has fracked more shale wells in Ohio than any other company.

Those numbers sound large, but the state receives an average of 82 billion gallons daily from clouds. The ODNR says Ohio consumers used about 8.7 billion gallons of water on an average day. The public used about 1.4 billion gallons while power plants pulled 6.6 billion gallons daily.

But environmentalists note water used in fracking cannot be treated and reintroduced to the water supply where it eventually will cycle through to become rain. By state law, all water used or produced in oil and gas mining must be sequestered deep underground by injection wells, although it can be reused from well to well.

Lea Harper, founder of the Southeast Ohio Alliance to Save Our Water, an anti-fracking organization, said “water is being wasted in a one-time use for a single industry.”

“We cannot make more water,” she said. “We can find renewable sources of energy.”

Harper has participated in rallies in opposition to the Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District, whose administration has argued it’s massive reservoirs are a more appropriate source for water withdrawals than creeks and small tributaries. Those smaller bodies of water, district conservancy Chief Sean Logan previously has said, could be threatened by the loss of several millions of gallons where as the effect on the district’s multi-billion gallon lakes would be imperceptible.

Ohio is a “reasonable use” state, meaning any publicly-accessible source of water can be drawn down, legally and for free, provided the withdrawing party does not infringe upon others’ right to do the same.

Chesapeake spokesman Pete Kenworthy said the Oklahoma City-based company employs a team of scientists to evaluate water sources.

“Regardless of the source, Chesapeake takes into consideration the available supply for other consumers or users,” he said. “We also ensure that there is no adverse effect on stream flow, aquatic life, recreational resources or sensitive environments.”

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