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RRC Approves Operator-Led Response Plans to Address Seismicity in Permian Basin
The RRC approved operator-led response plans to address seismicity in two areas of the Permian Basin. The plans call for variable reductions in disposal volumes of produced water (water that comes out of the ground with oil and gas during production) across all disposal wells. It will provide the RRC with additional information with the expansion of the seismic monitoring stations in the area, which will provide better data on the precise location and depth of earthquakes. With cooperation from operators of injection wells in the Northern Culberson-Reeves Seismic Response Area (SRA) – which is adjacent to Guadalupe Mountain National Park to the west and is near the border of New Mexico to the north – the agency began implementation of the first-ever operator-led response plan on March 1 to address the seismicity and ensure the safety of residents and the protection of the environment.
The plan is meant to reduce the intensity and frequency of earthquakes, such that recurrence of 3.5 or greater magnitude events is decreasing by December 31st, 2023. In May, the RRC approved an operator-led response plan for the Stanton SRA, which was created in January and has had more than nine earthquakes exceeding 3.0 magnitude, including a 4.2 earthquake north of the eponymous city in December 2020 and 4.6 in December 2021. The response plan is designed to reduce the frequency and intensity of earthquakes, including a goal to eliminate 3.5 magnitude or greater earthquakes no later than May 15, 2024. “Having the operators leading the effort to create the response plans allows for quicker actions that should ultimately lead to a reduction in the number and intensity of earthquakes,” said Sean Avitt, Manager of RRC’s Injection-Storage Permits Unit. “However, we made it clear if circumstances change, the Commission may have to take further actions to reduce seismicity.” In fact, following a 5.4 magnitude earthquake in Reeves County in November, the RRC implemented several revisions to the seismicity reduction response plan for the Northern Culberson-Reeves SRA.
The SRA boundary was expanded northward to the New Mexico border, which increased the size of the SRA from 2,366 square miles to 2,601 square miles. There are 78 active disposal wells in the revised SRA. The target for reducing daily injection volumes in deep disposal wells is being reduced even further. Operators of deep disposal wells in the Revised Response Plan agreed to reduce the collective volume of disposal from the original target of 298,000 barrels per day by June 30, 2023, to 162,000 barrels per day by that date. This would be about a 68% drop in disposal volume compared to January 2022 before the plan went into effect.
More changes will be on the way as RRC staff continue to study revisions to the shallow disposal well injection volume schedules in the SRA and will be looking at changes along with possible new data collection efforts. Northern Culberson-Reeves and Stanton are two of three seismic response areas the RRC created to address injection-induced seismic activity from disposal wells. The other is the Gardendale SRA between Odessa and Midland, where deep disposal was indefinitely suspended by the RRC in December 2021.
