With more than two dozen speakers and panelists from across the world, the Permian Basin Water in Energy Conference wrapped up Thursday at the Midland County Horseshoe and Pavilion.
There were about 450 registered participants and panel discussions on everything from produced water to environmental, social and governance issues to seismic activity. The number of participants was more than Founder Jim Woodcock was expecting with COVID.
Woodcock said there were people from Japan, Finland and around the U.S.
The conference connects industry leaders, experts and professionals to exchange best practices and cutting-edge approaches for the use of water in oil and gas production. The mission is to facilitate collaboration and innovative strategy development for the improved use, recovery, and recycling of water in oil and gas production, information from the conference says.
The Permian Basin Water In Energy Conference is a program of The University of Texas Permian Basin, allowing students at UTPB to directly benefit from the conference proceeds.
Although it wasn’t on the agenda, the Russian invasion of Ukraine was on the minds of those attending Thursday.
“So it’s kind of actually funny, we wrote a column in August of last year talking about Midland or Moscow. (Will) the future of the energy world be dictated in terms by Russian oligarchs in Moscow, or by peace-loving free markets in Midland. We knew that was going to be the case; not to this extent, frankly. It felt more (like) a geopolitical situation rather than an actual war. But I hate to say this wasn’t unprecedented and it wasn’t surprising. And so I think, you know, operators across the Permian have been actively engaged and prepared to operate to the best of our abilities, despite some changes in federal perspectives and of course, with a shifting focus in energy production. But at the end of the day, there’s no question that petroleum and its products — oil and natural gas — produced right here in the Permian Basin represent the best opportunity for our America and our allies,” Michael Lozano, communications and government affairs director of the Permian Basin Petroleum Association, said.
Lozano said currently the United States still imports Russian oil.
“That’s mitigated by domestic production. We produce … in the Permian in both Texas and New Mexico … about five million barrels a day. It’s record amounts at this time. We continue to see growth in the sector and I think we can continue to expect growth in the Permian,” Lozano said.
“It’s the fastest growing operations center in the country … Just yesterday I saw there were quite a few LNG vessels that are transporting Permian produced gas. That’s liquefied natural gas from the U.S. and they’ve shipped it from Southeast Asia to Europe overnight. That’s a huge shift. I think it’s representing very real demand in Eastern and Western Europe that is going to come as a result of ongoing sanctions …,” Lozano said.
He acknowledged that the work the men and women of the Basin do in the oilfield will take on even more significance.
“… I think we’ve always viewed the work here as really important. I think it’s now added importance because it’s not just for domestic production and jobs. It’s national security and global security. The reality is this is a real commodity and operators and this resource is going to be needed. It was either going to be produced by our less-than-friendly counterparts across the globe, or our enemies. Whether it was OPEC or OPEC-plus, which includes Russia, when it came to that it was either going to be them or it was gonna be domestic production. And I think we agree that free market produced oil and gas and in America is the better option,” Lozano said.
Woodcock said the conference featured a great group of speakers.
“Each one is addressing different aspects of water, primarily produced water — how it can be broken down, used again, the steps it goes through. We have a lot of different ideas about that. We have a man from the Colorado School of Mines that has spent a lot of time working on it. We have some people from companies … who actually try to … get the water to the point where we can use it for something, either agriculture, or hopefully, eventually drinking water. But it’s a huge, huge issue,” Woodcock said.
“Not many people realize we have 30 to 40 million barrels that produce water a day that we have to do something with. Not many people realize that each barrel of oil … we produce makes four to six barrels of produced water we have to do something with,” he added.
“It’s a real issue as we begin to produce more oil, we’re going to see this become a larger issue because (we’ll have) more and more barrels of produced water to do something with. … The thought is that produced water being re-injected is creating some of the seismicity issues that we’re seeing. And so I think we’re getting some good ideas. People are real enthusiastic about the speakers, about the things that are happening here, what they’re hearing. There’s a lot of mixing of people after the presentations, so I think so far it has been productive,” he said.
This is the fourth Water in Energy Conference.
“This is, I think, the most productive that we’ve had. We really zeroed in on some things that are of huge importance to this industry and also to our area,” Woodcock said.
He said the invasion of Ukraine by Russia has prompted a lot of talk, but it hasn’t been on stage as a topic.
“… But the fact is, we’re going to need, no matter what people in Washington say, we’re going to need to … produce more oil here. …,” Woodcock said.
He added that he’s seen a report that the U.S. gets 6 to 10 million barrels of oil a day from Russia.
“That’s a huge issue that we have to look at. I just hope we’re able to put together in Washington some consortiums and really look at the problems and issues and give us some guidance on how to move ahead in a constructive, productive way,” Woodcock said.
