THE DNA OF A TEXAS PERMIT

Join us on an adventure as we document here on LinkedIn, website, and social media our regulatory path that we are blazing to use Conservation By-Design™ to land-apply cleaned produced water in arid West Texas for non-consumable ag and conservation.  On our adventure, here’s our cast of characters: 

> The landowner in the white hat is Wilson Farms, a cotton farm in Midkiff. 

> Our friends, the regulatory bodies – from the EPA to the RRC.

> Our friends, the environmentalists who tend to shout from the sidelines.

> Our friends, the energy companies who like things just the way they are.

> And us, Total Ecological Solutions, trying to bring all the pieces together.

We’ll update our progress and tell the story from these points of view. We don’t have anything to hide and -- as we progress -- we’ll find out if anyone else does.

Hang on, join us for a great adventure! Share these posts on your LinkedIn or share posts from Encore Green Environmental. They’re re-posting them at EncoreGreenEnvironmental.com. 

Cut the Strings - a Parable

Here’s a parable of how we solve our produced water problem. Only thing is, it’s a real story told by a colleague:

“The first police officer reaches under the one-ton bale of hay and attempts to lift it off of me. Of course, it doesn’t budge. He grabs his flashlight and shines it under the hay into my face. I blink. He yells over his shoulder to his partner, “He’s alive! He’s alive! Help me move the hay.”

Even working together, two officers can’t move it – not a fraction of an inch. A thousand pounds each? Of course they can’t move it.

“Cut the strings,” I whisper. My voice is weak. They can’t hear me. I’m  not going to last much longer. If they will just cut the strings, the bale will break apart, and they can drag me out of here.

“Lift, Joe, lift!” I hear.
“Just cut the strings,” I mumble.
“C’mon harder.”
“It’s too heavy! We can’t lift it. We gotta go for help! Hang on, we’ll be right back!”

I am alone again in the growing darkness. Wonderful painless, peaceful, irresistible sleep beckons. I struggle to remain conscious. 

Where are they? How long does it take for police, fire, ambulance, to arrive? Where is the Coast Guard? Where are the Marines? Where is that one old farmer with enough common sense to just cut the strings?

The desert air grows chilly as the sky darkens. I grow weaker. Dizziness overcomes me and I begin to drift off into that gray space somewhere between the living and the dead.

Help finally arrives. One of the police officers bends down so I can see his face. “Hold on! A fire engine is here. There are six men aboard.”

I do the math. Two big, strong cops and six burly firemen must move a ton of dead weight off me. That’s two hundred forty five pounds each. No way can they possibly do that – but somehow, miraculously, they do. A couple of neighbors who have arrived at the scene stand by to catch me. They lower my limp body to the ground where I lie in a broken heap.

Why didn’t they cut the strings? They could have saved a long, tortured hour.

How heavy is hay? A piece of hay is about the weight of a feather. How many pieces of hay does it take to make two thousand pounds? Lots. That package of sixteen bazillion individual pieces of hay wrapped in a gigantic bundle is a crushing weight. But separated, it would have been nothing. I feel bad saying this, because it makes me sound ungrateful – and I am very grateful to the guys who saved my life that night – but there is a point to be made here, isn’t there?”

Yep, the point to be made is that the produced water problem is too heavy of a burden unless we cut the strings. Cut the strings of red tape. Cut the strings of preconceived ideas. Cut the strings of political agendas.

Don’t know how? Give a call and we can talk about it.

307.369.4444

YOU’RE PROBABLY NOT WORRIED ABOUT NOT HAVING WATER, RIGHT?

 We modern Americans don’t think about it. 99.9% of times we turn on the tap, we get water. But that’s 100% dependent on your aquifer having water. 

You see, your kitchen tap is not the only thing that asks the aquifer for water. The energy industry needs water to put INTO the oil wells in order to frack. Also, the billions of gallons of so-called produced water that comes OUT with the oil is often being pulled from the aquifer. 

Another industry also needs water: Agriculture. Because, well, we need food. 

So, there’s a lot of calls on the aquifer to deliver. 

Our patent-pending process called Conservation By-Design™ gives relief to the aquifer in these ways:

1. The water needed to frack is re-purposed from the formerly produced water that has been cleaned.

2. In the arid West, the ag community can get their water by cleaning all that produced water which the energy industry is tossing away. 

You will still need to have water come out of your kitchen sink. Conservation By-Design™ helps ensure that the water is there by not draining the aquifer for energy and ag.

Think about it next time you turn on your kitchen sink or take a swig.

WHAT’S YOUR EXCUSE THIS TIME?

Go ahead. Tell us.

We’ll nod and wait for you to finish before we tell you that not only have we heard the excuses, we’ve answered them. It wasn’t easy. When we first talked to the energy industry about using cleaned produced water to land-apply on the surrounding soil, we heard some great objections: economics, liability, regulatory.

Well, we’ve answered all of them:

Economics : We will take the produced water and “dispose” of it by cleaning and putting on the ground for the same or less cost than you’re paying for your total water disposal costs right now.

Liability: We’ll take the liability and sign all the liability release papers you pay the lawyers to draft.

Regulatory: We have the only permits in the US to land-apply this water. 

So, what’s the excuse now?

WYOMING COULD BE THE ESG LEADER – WILL WE?

 You can’t read a business article these days without mention of ESG – Environment, Stewardship, Governance. ESG is a commitment that everyone from Fortune 100 companies to mom & pop stores are making to be responsible for the environment and the way they treat clients, customers, and employees. Wyoming could be the leader in this space. 

·  Wyoming is in the forefront of land stewardship at the top levels of government and the day to day workings of landowners stewarding their own land. 

·  Wyoming has a vibrant energy sector with oil, gas, and coal and could be the leader in carbon sequestration in those very areas.

·  Wyoming is already associated with conservation and the great outdoors.

·  Wyoming could attract massive economic development by being the leader in ESG.

Just one question: Will we? 

Or are we focused on the past and our to-do list for today. The role of ESG leader and the subsequent benefits is on the table for Wyoming to pick up. 

We sure hope the corporations, businesses, and policymakers will. We know the path if you’d like to talk about it.

WHEN IT’S US OR EMINENT DOMAIN, CALL US

.he rocky relationship that landowners have with oil companies can break down in a hurry. And pretty soon, ‘eminent domain’ starts being discussed, which is kind of like hunting squirrels with a shotgun. You might get a squirrel, but there’s not much left of him.

Extreme measures like eminent domain might get what an oil company wants in short term, if they can afford the legal fees and delays, but it ultimately will be less than ideal. 

We can help everybody come together for an ideal solution. We don’t mind the messy conversation.

When you need a better way, give us a call, 307.369.4444.

BE SMARTER THAN A WHOPPER

It seems like that if Burger King has figured out that we can be more ecologically friendly by innovation, the oil and gas energy industry could get on board. I mean, we don’t think flipping burgers is harder than getting oil out of the ground. 

The folks in the Houston oil company skyscrapers are all for ESG and doing right by the land. But, so far, it hasn’t completely left the board room and made its way out to the oil field. 

Maybe watch this video, but instead of farting cows, think about re-purposing that produced water to put on the land to grow things and clean up the air. 

We even have a hat and a guitar, not to mention a patent-pending process and the only land-application permits in the US. Let’s get smarter than a Whopper — unless you want to be the folks left behind when the rest of the industry calls us.

THE LAND CAN

As energy company E & P’s deal with how to financially survive at $ 35 -- $40 oil, water costs are the elephant in the room (no offense to elephants). Energy companies must: 

 1) Find the oil

2) Produce the oil

3 ) Transfer the oil to refiners 

4) Develop ESG and carbon neutral plans as requested by their shareholders

5) But…what about the other costs like produced water management?

I spent several years working for an independent oil company during $40 oil and every day it was about how to do the above for less cost.

Squire the acreage, install midstream, establish surface use agreements, move the drilling rig, frac the well, dispose of produced water, bring the well in – all doing the above with excellence but at less cost. 

Who can do all that? Well, the land can. The solutions to carbon neutrality/ESG goals and less cost is the very soil where the oil and gas are setting.

Give us a call and we’ll go into details.

SEISMIC: IT’S THE DISPOSAL, NOT THE FRACKING

This Washington Post article from a few years ago and research from University of Texas (see links) point to the hard truth that it’s not the fracking causing Texas and Oklahoma to shake, rattle, and roll. It’s the injection wells shoving the produced water down the hole under extreme pressure. 

Our patent-pending Conservation By-Design™ solves this problem. Instead of high pressure injection, we land-apply cleaned by-product water on stable, non-shaking soil. This has a lot of positive effects like better soil and better air quality. But it also eliminates the negative effect of seismic activity. 

Yes, sometimes the quakes are out in the middle of nowhere. Yes, sometimes the quakes are small. But what are we going to do when a major city is hit? Change our minds then? Let’s change our minds now. 

University of Texas link: http://www.jsg.utexas.edu/news/2018/11/where-water-goes-after-fracking-is-tied-to-earthquake-risk/

Washington Post link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/fracking-is-not-the-cause-of-quakes-rather-its-frackings-wastewater/2015/04/27/e87a6e82-e9f4-11e4-aae1-d642717d8afa_story.html

WE NOW OFFER COUPLES THERAPY FOR LANDOWNERS & OIL COMPANIES

We’re only kidding – well, only partially kidding. Landowners with surface rights and oil companies with mineral rights have an uneasy relationship, but they stick together not for the kids, but for the dollars. And it sometimes works. But other times, that relationship needs help.

At EGE, we’re an ag company that helps bring stakeholders together. Our program of re-purposing by-product/produced water costs the same or less than traditional disposal. But it will keep you out of divorce court with the landowner. W

e can sit down and formulate a plan where everyone wins. When you’ve had enough of the strife, call us. We’re here to help and we cost less than a divorce lawyer….  307.369.4444.