Water Use and Management in the Bakken Shale Oil Play.

摘要

Development in the Bakken shale oil play of North Dakota has seen significant growth since 2008. Extraction of oil from the Bakken play requires the employment of hydraulic fracturing techniques, which can use, on average, between 1.7 and 2.4 million gallons of water per well. This study provides an overview of water quantity impacts of development in the North Dakota portion of the Bakken play by estimating water demand for hydraulic fracturing, estimating domestic water demand by the large oil services population that has temporarily moved to the area, quantifying existing water resources, and discussing the means for meeting future demand. Water use for hydraulic fracturing in the North Dakota portion of the Bakken play is estimated utilizing data from FracFocus.org and the North Dakota Department of Mineral Resources, and is found to have grown from 680 million gallons in 2008 to almost 4.3 billion gallons in 2012. Most of this use is concentrated in 2 out of 14 watershed subbasins covering the area of study. It is estimated that the growth in oil service workers temporarily residing in Williams County, at the center of the development activity, has resulted in an increase in domestic water demand equal to the increase in demand from hydraulic fracturing activities across the North Dakota Bakken play. Existing groundwater sources are not equal to the growing demand for water due to oil development, but surface water sources in the areaprimarily the Missouri River systemappear to be more than able to accommodate anticipated growth, provided that access is acquired. To better and more fully characterize the situation, more data is needed on actual water used for hydraulic fracturing activities, the specific sources of water for those activities, the amount of maintenance water needed over the lifetime of a well, and the economic viability of flowback water recycling for hydraulic fracturing.