PECOS, Texas—Excessive drought has diminished the flows of the Rio Grande and Pecos River, two of essentially the most iconic waterways in Texas.
The advocacy group American Rivers lately named the Lower Rio Grande one among its most endangered rivers, describing a “near-permanent human-induced megadrought threatening all life that relies on it.” On the Pecos River, there hasn’t been sufficient water to distribute to irrigation districts beneath the Purple Bluff Reservoir lately.
Whereas farmers and cities face rising water shortage, oil and fuel corporations use billions of gallons of water from these rivers yearly. An unique Inside Local weather Information evaluation discovered that drillers used greater than 31,000 acre toes, or greater than 10 billion gallons, of Rio Grande water for drilling and fracking operations within the Eagle Ford Shale between 2021 and 2024.
That’s sufficient water to fulfill the wants of 113,500 Texas households for a complete 12 months, based mostly on common each day use of 246 gallons per family. On the Purple Bluff Reservoir on the Pecos River, Daniel Arrant of Kingsley Water Firm stories to have offered greater than 75 million barrels of water, or greater than 4 billion gallons, for oil and fuel operations since 2016.
Quite a few Texas oil and fuel corporations have made voluntary commitments to cut back their freshwater use and shift to brackish or recycled water to be used in fracking for oil and fuel. However the water gross sales, like these reported by Arrant of the Kingsley Water Firm, present that oil and fuel drilling continues to be reliant on floor water from Texas rivers.
Floor water offered for drilling and fracking is categorized as “mining” consumption underneath Texas legislation. Pumping water underground to drill or frack a effectively typically completely removes it from the pure hydrologic cycle, given the presence of chemical fracking fluids and pure toxins like arsenic following its use within the extraction course of for oil or fuel.
Inside Local weather Information obtained Rio Grande water knowledge from the Texas Fee on Environmental High quality (TCEQ) by way of a public information request. Kingsley Water Firm, an oil discipline water companies agency based mostly within the Woodlands, a Houston suburb, was the highest consumer of Rio Grande water for oil and fuel drilling, adopted by SM Power Firm, Segundo Navarro Drilling, and Choose Water Options.
Between the Rio Grande and the Pecos River, Kingsley has offered sufficient water for drilling to fulfill the wants of greater than 100,000 Texas households for a 12 months. Kinglsey and Arrant didn’t reply to a number of requests for remark.
State Consultant Vikki Goodwin criticized Apache Corp. for getting water from the Pecos River when, she says, recycled ”produced water” from fracking was accessible. Inside Local weather Information independently confirmed the water buy.
“Investments in tasks to scrub up and recycle frack water will dry up if oil corporations don’t choose to make use of the recycled water,” Goodwin, a Democrat who represents Travis County, mentioned. “My hope is we don’t wait till too late to make higher selections about our water sources in Texas.”
A spokesperson for Apache, headquartered in Houston, mentioned the corporate “minimizes the usage of contemporary water” and is utilizing “non-fresh, non-potable” water for fracking its oil and fuel wells in Loving County close to the reservoir.
Eagle Ford Drillers Faucet Rio Grande
Tributaries in Mexico feed the Rio Grande in South Texas. However with Mexico behind on water deliveries to the USA, tensions on the river are excessive. The Amistad Reservoir, the place water delivered by Mexico is saved, hit a historic low in July 2024.
Excessive drought in counties like Webb and Maverick, in keeping with the U.S. Drought Monitor, is compounding the issue. Groundwater springs and tributaries are feeding much less water into the river. Flows have decreased on the Rio Grande by more than 30% in latest a long time.
The Rio Grande is the only supply of consuming water for town of Laredo in Webb County. Due to the drought, Laredo has requested residents to cut back water use for a number of consecutive years. Planners are contemplating costly alternative water sources to organize for the day, projected to come back round 2040, when the Rio Grande gained’t be sufficient to provide town.
Agriculture consumes the lion’s share of Rio Grande water, adopted by municipal use. Whereas groundwater is the first supply for oil and fuel drilling, a number of corporations nonetheless eat substantial volumes of floor water from the river. Webb County is on the coronary heart of the fracking growth that took off in South Texas’s Eagle Ford Shale formation in 2010. The Eagle Ford Shale is now persistently one of many high three oil-producing basins within the nation.
Inside Local weather Information discovered that between 2020 and 2024, Kingsley Water Firm used 12,363 acre toes of Rio Grande water, SM Power used 11,379 acre toes, Segundo Navarro used 3,979 acre toes, and Choose Water used 3,776 acre toes. An acre foot is the quantity of water wanted to cowl one acre of land to a depth of 1 foot, or 325,851 gallons. The businesses didn’t reply to requests for remark.
Rio Grande water rights are overseen by the TCEQ Rio Grande Watermaster. Water rights are adjudicated by the state after which may be purchased and offered by personal events. Rights holders are allowed to divert a pre-approved quantity of water at a particular location. Most of those rights are held by cities, farmers, and irrigation districts. Oilfield corporations maintain a small quantity.
Kingsley Water Firm is a subsidiary of Kingsley Constructors, headquartered within the Woodlands. In 2011, Daniel Arrant “led the acquisition and allowing” of the Rio Grande water rights, in keeping with the website of Voyager, the Houston personal fairness agency the place he’s a accomplice. Arrant entered contracts to resell the water to operators finishing wells within the Eagle Ford Shale. These offers have offered greater than 235 million barrels, or 9.87 billion gallons, of Rio Grande water, in keeping with the Voyager web site.
Choose Water Options, headquartered in Gainesville, Texas, additionally resells Rio Grande water to drilling corporations. The corporate’s 2023 sustainability report states that it locations “the utmost significance on secure, environmentally accountable administration of water.”
Choose Water Options reported promoting a bigger share of recycled water annually between 2020 and 2023. However the complete quantity of freshwater offered additionally elevated in 2023 to a four-year excessive of greater than 97 million barrels, or greater than 4 billion gallons.
SM Power, a Denver-based unbiased exploration and manufacturing firm, doesn’t have public sustainability targets for minimizing water use and defending water high quality. Neither does San Antonio-based Segundo Navarro Drilling, a subsidiary of Lewis Power Group.
TCEQ doesn’t gather knowledge on how oil and fuel corporations use the floor water they buy. Drilling, effectively completion, and fracking are all totally different steps within the lifecycle of a effectively that require water.
TCEQ spokesperson Ricky Richter mentioned that between 2009 and 2023, annual floor water use for mining, which incorporates oil and fuel operations, averaged 40,000 acre toes statewide, or about 13 billion gallons. TCEQ defines “mining” use as “water for mining processes together with hydraulic use, drilling, washing sand and gravel, and oil discipline repressuring.”
Martin Castro, watershed science director on the Rio Grande Worldwide Examine Middle (RGISC) in Laredo, analyzed water use in oil and fuel operations for a 2021 report. He discovered drillers used 19 billion gallons of Rio Grande water between 2010 and 2020.
“Any reductions of the river’s water provide, when coupled with recurring droughts, may have disastrous penalties for Webb County and South Texas,” Castro wrote on the time.
Inside Local weather Information’s evaluation discovered barely increased annual charges of water diversions for oil and fuel between 2021 to 2024 than charges famous in RGISC’s report spanning the previous decade. Castro was involved that drillers are nonetheless utilizing massive volumes of Rio Grande water.
“We’re not doing any higher than 4 years in the past,” he mentioned.
Castro beforehand labored for TCEQ and noticed water diversions used for fracking. However he mentioned that, with out reporting necessities, the true scale is unknown. Castro want to see TCEQ gather knowledge on how a lot floor water goes to drilling versus fracking. He has additionally known as on TCEQ to publish Rio Grande water diversion knowledge, which at present is just accessible by way of data requests.
“There isn’t any transparency,” he mentioned.
RGISC collaborated with American Rivers in its marketing campaign that named the Decrease Rio Grande one of many nation’s most endangered rivers. Castro mentioned enhancing resilience on the river would require considering outdoors of the field and rising funding.
“The one approach we’re going to enhance circumstances on the river is that if we make critical federal investments,” he mentioned.
Water rights downstream of Amistad Reservoir on the Rio Grande function on a precedence system, which ensures cities get their share of water throughout occasions of shortage.
“Precedence is given to municipal use, and municipal precedence is assured by way of a municipal reserve,” mentioned TCEQ spokesperson Laura Lopez. “Water for mining use, as with irrigation and leisure use, is allotted to a water proper holder’s account based mostly on accessible storage within the system.”
Pecos River Water Bought from Purple Bluff Reservoir
The Pecos River begins within the mountains of New Mexico and flows by way of West Texas to fulfill the Rio Grande. An inter-state compact requires New Mexico to ship Pecos River water to Texas, the place it’s impounded on the Purple Bluff Reservoir.
Diminished flows on the Pecos have lowered water ranges at Purple Bluff. On paper, the Purple Bluff Energy and Irrigation District, which manages the reservoir, holds rights to 292,500 acre toes a 12 months of water. Nevertheless it’s been a very long time since there was that a lot water within the reservoir. Purple Bluff sat at 65,000 acre toes in early Might. Due to the low reservoir ranges, Purple Bluff is commonly unable to ship water downstream to irrigation districts.
Kingsley secured the mining water proper in 2014 for as much as 7,500 acre toes of water a 12 months, about 2.44 billion gallons. The Purple Bluff district advised Inside Local weather Information that Kinglsey bought 1,400 acre toes, or greater than 450 million gallons, in 2024.
District normal supervisor Robin Prewit mentioned the water gross sales to grease and fuel drillers are “a drop within the bucket.” She mentioned that even when the district didn’t promote water to Kingsley, due to evaporation and transportation losses, there wouldn’t be sufficient water to ship to the irrigation districts.
“I’m not having to decide on one or the opposite,” she mentioned.
What she mentioned she may actually use is extra rain within the Pecos River watershed in New Mexico.
Salinity is one other problem. The water at Purple Bluff is salty sufficient to be thought-about brackish. Farmers within the space develop salt-tolerant vegetation. However to be potable for human consumption the water must be handled. Apache, which bought water from Kinglsey early this 12 months, reported using 98.2% “nonfresh” water in 2023. Water from Purple Bluff could be thought-about “nonfresh” due to the salinity ranges.
Ernest Woodward, a rancher outdoors McCamey, opposes the water gross sales for oil and fuel drilling. “It shouldn’t be,” he mentioned. “It’s for irrigation.”
He gave up farming barley after a number of years with out irrigation water from Purple Bluff. “You go to all of the labor to get the land ready, and then you definitely don’t get the water,” he mentioned.
Woodward want to see water flowing within the river once more.
“We don’t have sufficient water,” he mentioned. “We’re ravenous.”
This text initially appeared on Inside Climate News. It’s republished with permission. Join its publication here.
