LITTLE ROCK — The Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission approved on Tuesday the first permit for a disposal well for Fayetteville Shale natural-gas drilling wastewater since a 1,100-square-mile ban on such wells due to earthquakes was established in July.
The well, which will be in southern Johnson County near the Pope County line, is not in the ban zone, which is mostly in Faulkner and Cleburne counties.
Several at the hearing, including the company and the commission staff, said there is no danger that the well will cause earthquakes. However, several residents who live near the proposed well oppose its construction, citing concerns over their water supplies and the amount of road traffic the well would cause.
Gainesville, Texas-based Select Energy Services LLC said about 15 trucks working around the clock now carry between 3,000 and 4,000 barrels of water a day from the shale formation in north-central Arkansas to disposal wells in Oklahoma.
Select Energy attorney David Butler said there is a need for disposal wells closer to the shale.
“If the industry doesn’t figure out a way to get rid of the water [with the low price of natural gas today], the oil and gas industry won’t be able to get rid of the water,” Butler said. He added that could lead to a decrease in the number of wells drilled.
There are more than 4,000 natural gas wells in the Fayetteville Shale. Companies use hydraulic fracturing, or fracking — injecting millions of gallons of water laced with chemicals and sand into the well to break up rock and release gas. The water that comes back up containing toxic chemicals needs to be recycled, injected into dedicated wells or otherwise disposed of.
Four wells operating in the Fayetteville Shale were shut down in July after the Arkansas Geological Survey concluded there was a correlation between the disposal wells and thousands of minor earthquakes near the Guy-Greenbrier fault in Faulkner County.
After the shutdown, only 14 wells remained operating in the northern half of the state, Select Energy Vice President Phillip Boren said during the hearing. There are more than 500 in south Arkansas.
“There’s no risk of earthquakes in this area,” Boren said, referring to the Johnson County disposal well.
Currently, Boren said Select Energy trucks water for BHP Billiton, the secondlargest producer in the Fayetteville Shale.
The proposed disposal well could take nearly 25,000 barrels of water a day for more than 10 years, Boren said.
Several area residents who spoke at the meeting or wrote letters to the commission expressed concern that the wastewater might contaminate their well water.
Leo Knoernschild, who lives near the proposed well, said residents of the area fear the wastewater will get into local water supplies, which come from private wells. He said he was also fearful that the well would deplete the area’s aquifers.
The company did not respond to those concerns.
“I am concerned about the environmental effects of having toxic water injected below my property,” Knoernschild said.
But Boren said Select Energy plans to go above state requirements to prevent leaking. He said it would double-case the well in cement, and the well would go down nearly 1,000 feet below the nearest aquifer.
Opponents gasped when it was announced that the well could take up to 25,000 barrels of water a day with 240 trips a day, coming and going.
“When those trucks are coming at you on a two-lane highway, one of us has to go into a ditch,” Knoernschild’s wife, Sharon, said. “And those big trucks aren’t usually the ones going into the ditch.”
The commission said it doesn’t regulate the highway and wouldn’t consider road problems when deciding the disposal-well application.
After the testimony, five commissioners voted in favor of the well, two — George Carder and William Dawkins — recused themselves from voting and Chris Weiser and Charles Wohlford were absent. Carder and Dawkins didn’t explain why they recused themselves.
Also at the day-long hearing, an application by Houston-based Southwestern Energy to burn off natural gas at a test well for oil in south Arkansas was approved by eight commissioners, with Charles Wohlford absent.
Southwestern Energy has finished drilling a well in the Lower Smackover Brown Dense formation in hopes of extracting oil. It asked the commission to allow it to burn off the natural gas while it tests different methods of extracting oil.
Company spokesman Susan Richardson on Friday said it didn’t have any news about the test well. She did not respond to follow-up questions Tuesday about the proposed burnoff.
Business, Pages 27 on 12/07/2011