American Oil and Gas Reporter - February 2019 - 58

ions to 350 mg/liter. This indicates that
for brines with a low salinity but a higher
concentration of divalent ions, the selectivity of the membrane must increase to
be completely effective or be used without
chemical precipitation.

Economic Results
Figure 3 shows the results of the economic analysis. The least economically
viable case was the high-hardness Frio
brine treated with the base line design. It
had the highest chemical cost because of

the high initial concentration of divalent
ions. The high-salinity Frio using the
base line design also had a high chemical
cost, as well as the greatest MVR cost
because of the high theoretical minimum
work of separation. The Eagle Ford brine

Water Demand Soaring In Horizontal Resource Plays
According to analysis from Spears
and Associates, operators sourced an
estimated 6.4 billion barrels of water
for use in drilling and hydraulic fracturing
in 2018 in the United States, up 43 percent year over year.
Moreover, as a result of continued
growth in drilling and production activity
in onshore resource plays, the firm projects
that water volumes for drilling and completion operations will exceed 10 billion
barrels by 2023, representing a 10 percent
compound annual growth rate.
U.S. demand for water management
services associated with the acquisition,
transport, transfer, storage, flowback,
treatment and disposal of water increased
25 percent in 2018 to $23 billion as a
result of increased horizontal drilling
activity, increased per-well frac job size,
and increased recycling/treatment activity,
Spears and Associates reports.
Research from Rystad Energy un-

derscores "skyrocketing demand" for
water in hydraulic fracturing operations.
It estimates that consumption has more
than doubled since 2016. In fact, Rystad
says demand in the Permian Basin alone
now exceeds total U.S. frac water demand
in 2016.
Looking ahead, Rystad's forecast calls
for water usage to expand by an additional
6 percent in 2019 to 6.3 billion barrels
(Figure 1). Much of the growth, of
course, is focused on the Permian Basin,
where Senior Vice President Ryan Carbrey says demand is likely to surpass
2.5 billion barrels by 2020.
"This surge is driven by both increased
activity and higher proppant intensity.
But even with such steep growth, market
concerns about sourcing challenges and
bottlenecks appear to be minimal," he
comments.
Carbrey says the market for water
treatment continues to see strong growth,

with a 28 percent expansion to 1.4 billion barrels in 2018. Again, the Permian
is expected to see substantial water
treatment growth, surpassing 800 million
barrels by 2021. Growth in treatment
utilization is driven by larger operators
that can make necessary investments
in treatment systems, Rystad Energy
points out.
With produced water in the Permian
set to increase by one-third by 2021,
Carbrey suggests that local disposal
constraints will emerge, but says spare
disposal capacity will remain at a macro
level. "Water disposal is not currently
an issue across the Permian as a whole,
but some operators are having local difficulties. We expect the water disposal
market in 2021 will be tighter due to
significant water production increases
from the Delaware (sub-basin). More
infrastructure would be needed beyond
2021," Carbrey concludes.
r

FIGURE 1
U.S. Onshore Water Demand

7.0

Forecast
6.3

6.0
4.9

Billion Barrels

5.0
4.0

5.4

3.5

3.0

2.7

2.0

1.2

1.0
0.0

5.2

2011

Permian

1.6

2012

Eagle Ford

1.8

2013

2014

Mid-Con

Source: Rystad Energy
58 THE AMERICAN OIL & GAS REPORTER

2.4

2015

Appalachia

1.9

2016

2017

DJ Basin

2018

Bakken

2019

Haynesville

2020

2021

Rest of U.S.
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