Updates
December 24, 2013:
Rigzone is reporting (unfortunately, a long article that didn't say much) --
Water
recycling represents a major opportunity for firms that provide
equipment and services to the shale gas industry, according to Johan
Pfeiffer, FMC Technologies Inc. vice president for Surface Technologies.
And the opportunity is greater outside of the United States in
countries where the cost of water disposal is high due to geographical
and regulatory pressures, Pfeiffer said in a presentation to Tudor,
Pickering, Holt & Co.'s Global Shale Conference in London at the end
of November.
Speaking about the shale gas industry from an oilfield services point of
view, Pfeiffer noted:
"The operators in North America are trying to get as much production as
possible out of the well pad. In order to do this, they use increasing
complexity in the well that provides an opportunity for service
providers."
July 14, 2013: Halliburton's process for recycling frack water is called "
H20Forward."
"If you really think about it," he continued, "as an industry we make
more water than we make hydrocarbons. In fact, we make about 3-5
barrels of water per barrel of hydrocarbons." Some have told him that
their primary job was to produce water, and oil was the byproduct.
In spite of a literal flood of produced water
available, it historically has been injected, at certain cost, instead
of being reused in the fracturing process because it was "too dirty."
With unacceptable amounts of total dissolve solids (TDS) and total
suspended solids (TSS) it would clog formations instead of placing
proppants and opening formations to the flow of hydrocarbons.
Before Dale went to Halliburton he worked for a
water treatment company that was asked by a client to develop a way to
use city effluent in cooling towers. As Dale pondered the question,
including costs to clean the water, then to dispose of those removed
substances, it came to him: "When we looked at the economics, we
realized that, what if we just change the chemistry that allows them to
use that water so you don't have to take stuff out?" He referred to this
as "impaired waters." The price point changed dramatically when those
costs were figured.
Halliburton's product/service is called H2O
Forward "that allows customers to take these waste streams and use them
for the supply chain needs," Dale explained. He was quick to point out
that this does include some water treatment, but due to changes in frac
fluids, the water requires much less treatment than does water processed
for use with conventional fluids.
Original Post
I've posted once or twice about "produced water" -- recycled frack water. Don sent me the link to an article on the subject.
PrairieBizMagazine is reporting:
About 40 percent of the water used for fracking flows back to the well
surface, but re-using that water is made difficult due to its high
saline content, according to research conducted by the Energy &
Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota.
Therefore, water used for fracking is primarily fresh water, and
flowback water is treated before being disposed of in deep injection
wells.
There is more background at the link, but here is where it gets interesting:
In March, Halliburton announced that it has commercialized technology
to recycle frack flowback water, which the company refers to as
produced water, and that it has completed more than 60 wells and 280
fracturing stages in the Permian and Bakken formations using this
approach. According to the company, the technology uses electricity to
destabilize and coagulate contaminants in the water, which can then be
removed, allowing for the remaining water to be re-used for fracking.
Walter
Dale, Halliburton global strategic business manager – water management
solutions, says the technology’s commercialization represents a
“paradigm shift” in the need for fresh water for fracking operations.
“This is no longer a technical issue; this is a function of logistics,”
he said in a statement. “Customers can now use produced water on
unconventional wells with no loss of well productivity at a net economic
benefit while minimizing the overall environmental impact.”
Halliburton says its technology has been proven to save up to $400,000 per well in the Bakken.
I assume others will research the technology including
Heckmann-->Nuveera Environmental Solutions.
But it looks like it is time for a new tag: produced_water.
By the way, the linked article at
PrairieBiz referenced a Halliburton-electricity-based process. There is also a vortex-based process which will work nicely for cleaning oil from oil spills into flowing water, such as rivers.
