Environment & Energy

Much of that is in Texas, now home to exciting new geological attractions:

Apache Corp. sounded an alarm in 2017 that few appeared to hear. The Houston oil company warned of potentially dangerous faults and fractures in its Reeves County oil field that could allow the oil industry’s toxic wastewater to flow into protected groundwater and natural springs, regulatory filings show.

Seven years later, a saltwater geyser carrying poisonous hydrogen sulfide gas erupted from the same field, outside Toyah, shooting 100 feet high. It also appeared to contain oil. The geyser, still gushing two weeks later, is a black eye for Texas regulators responsible for preventing and addressing these types of oil field failures. The blowout at an old well, once owned by a Kinder Morgan subsidiary, comes just weeks before the oil industry’s most powerful regulator, Railroad Commission Chairman Christi Craddick, faces a contested reelection bid.

“Chairman Craddick takes the recent events in West Texas seriously,” Craddick’s Director of Public Affairs Mia Hutchens Hale said Tuesday in a statement, noting “a recent uptick in activity is undeniable.” Hale added that Craddick has a record of “meaningful” and “impactful” regulation and said the commission is “actively analyzing data” to better understand and address the forces causing problems in West Texas.

The geyser erupted weeks after a 5.1 magnitude earthquake rattled West Texas and sent tremors through Austin, Dallas and San Antonio. Earthquakes in the region have been linked to the oil and gas industry’s practice of injecting wastewater underground. It remains unclear what caused the geyser, which has erupted in an area with complex geology not visible to the naked eye. But experts say it is possible that Apache’s warnings came true, and that faults beneath the oil field’s surface allowed water to travel underground and into an old well.

EDIT

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/who-s-to-blame-for-the-geyser-still-erupting-in-west-texas-documents-start-to-unravel-mystery/ar-AA1smJ3m

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