Gone fracking!

ErnieM

Joined Apr 24, 2011
8,377
The company I am working with has developed its own process for being able to use raw flow back water and production water for the next fracking job opposed to bringing in fresh water for every well.
I'm pleased to hear this. My one (up till now) reservation of the fracking process was my assumpting that the water pumped down stayed down, and my concern was just how much surface water is being lost in the process.
 

shortbus

Joined Sep 30, 2009
10,045
Fracking is not new, just publicised more now. I have two wells(gas) drilled on my property, and both were fracked. Drilled in 1999, both are directional or horizontal wells. And I don't live "out in the boondocks", but in a small 'township' 29,000 population.
 
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ErnieM

Joined Apr 24, 2011
8,377
I am surprised you don't recognize the contradiction in this statement.
I'm surprised you're surprised.

If my power goes out and my stove becomes a small storage cabinet I can survive for the long term.

If my car dies but I can still walk about and again I can survive for the long term.

But if I have no water I’d dead within days.
 

sirch2

Joined Jan 21, 2013
1,037
I'm int the UK and we have a massive fracking debate going on over here at the moment. One concern that has been raised with respect to aquifer contamination is maintenance of exhausted wells. Someone did a study of of on-shore oil wells and found that pretty much all were not maintained after completion and a good proportion had been lost - i.e. landscaped over. The well casing will surely fail eventually and the there is potential for contaminates to travel up/down the well and pollute any aquifers that the well passes through.

Personally I am in favour of fracking but issues like this need to be regulated for.
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
I am surprised you don't recognize the contradiction in this statement.
I have lived without power or a car for a week. We had food and water, and could hoof it (and did) for more water.

No contradiction, just a basic truth. Perhaps one you have trouble accepting, but a truth none the less. A fundamental one for many parts of the world.

In areas of the world where the temperature tops 110°F you can die from lack of water in less than a day. While we use electricity to transport water it is not absolutely required, but a source of fresh water is.
 
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shortbus

Joined Sep 30, 2009
10,045
I'm int the UK and we have a massive fracking debate going on over here at the moment. One concern that has been raised with respect to aquifer contamination is maintenance of exhausted wells. Someone did a study of of on-shore oil wells and found that pretty much all were not maintained after completion and a good proportion had been lost - i.e. landscaped over. The well casing will surely fail eventually and the there is potential for contaminates to travel up/down the well and pollute any aquifers that the well passes through.

Personally I am in favour of fracking but issues like this need to be regulated for.
Don't know about the UK, but here the wells a drilled way over diameter to several hundred feet( below the local aquifer level) and pumped full of cement under slight pressure. After the cement sets, they drill the casing size hole through the cement. When drilling is done and casing in place they grout the hole under pressure, to seal the steel casing to the cement.

There are in this area shallow oil wells from the late 1800's early 1900's that the casings still haven't rusted clear through yet.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,979
Don't know about the UK, but here the wells a drilled way over diameter to several hundred feet( below the local aquifer level) and pumped full of cement under slight pressure. After the cement sets, they drill the casing size hole through the cement. When drilling is done and casing in place they grout the hole under pressure, to seal the steel casing to the cement.

There are in this area shallow oil wells from the late 1800's early 1900's that the casings still haven't rusted clear through yet.
But what happens in another hundred or two hundred years when they have rusted clear through?

It might not be unreasonable to require that wells that aren't going to be held in production or reserve be sealed by pumping concrete or even a suitable mud mixture down the hole.
 

loosewire

Joined Apr 25, 2008
1,686
Did I hear,water and shut down in the same post. Do you get paid when you are shut

down for 36 hours...follow the money.
 
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sirch2

Joined Jan 21, 2013
1,037
Don't know about the UK, but here the wells a drilled way over diameter to several hundred feet( below the local aquifer level) and pumped full of cement under slight pressure. After the cement sets, they drill the casing size hole through the cement. When drilling is done and casing in place they grout the hole under pressure, to seal the steel casing to the cement.

There are in this area shallow oil wells from the late 1800's early 1900's that the casings still haven't rusted clear through yet.

They thought they had grouted the casing at Deepwater Horizon...

I know it is perfectly possible to make a well last for 1000 years, it's just that it needs regulating and inspecting. It needs to be done properly on every well but we all know that commercial pressures will cause corners to be cut. This is especially true when the company doing the drilling/casing etc. will eventually abandon the site and have no on-going liability.

If anything the UK is overly cautious and over-burdened with regulations. We haven't even got beyond one or two trial fracks and the BANANA's are out in force. So we will end up with a Rolls Royce job in the UK but that still doesn't mean there won't be things that come back to bite us in a century or so.
 

Brownout

Joined Jan 10, 2012
2,390
If anything the UK is overly cautious and over-burdened with regulations. We haven't even got beyond one or two trial fracks and the BANANA's are out in force. So we will end up with a Rolls Royce job in the UK but that still doesn't mean there won't be things that come back to bite us in a century or so.
A 2005 law makes fracking virtually exempt from regulation in the US.
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
My advice has been, if you want to lease your land for fracking, be responsible and lease to a big enough company that has something to lose if they make a mistake.

The small guys just file bankruptcy, dissolve their company and walk away.

The current big players in my area (not too far away from Short Bus), are playing pretty responsibly and the protestors are staying quiet as they see the economic activity in the rural areas pick up. Erie, PA to Clearfield and southeast back Washington PA is all hopping with trucks full of pipe, men with cash in their hands buying lunch at the local bars, motorcycles at local shops and renting hotels. Two new hotels were built nearby and half the rooms in each hotel have long-term leases from Range Resources. There are hundreds of water-transport and pumping trucks moving in and out of a huge new terminal in Brookfield, PA.

An amazing change from 4 years ago when small towns in these regions were full of 20-year-olds with nothing to do. The local motorcycle shop owner said he has never sold so many bikes and most are moving without loans.

We know we are in some type of economic progress because we have had quite a number of out-of-state women arrested for practicing an ancient profession.
 

Thread Starter

tcmtech

Joined Nov 4, 2013
2,867
We know we are in some type of economic progress because we have had quite a number of out-of-state women arrested for practicing an ancient profession.
I never thought of hunter/gathers as a being the trouble maker type of people. Somebody get their garden raided? :confused:
 

Thread Starter

tcmtech

Joined Nov 4, 2013
2,867
I got my first week in and everything went well.

I even go the strong impression I am changing the image of being an E-tech to being a good thing. :p

It's amazing what listening to a bunch of high paid whiners does to improve their moral. :D
 
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