During the 10th Permian Basin Water in Energy Conference, held earlier this month in Midland, several ranchers and producers with the Texas Alliance for Water Conservation (TAWC) demonstrated how produced water, long seen as a liability, might be repurposed to irrigate crops and sustain livestock.
Produced water isn’t well or tap water. Oil and gas drillers inject a mixture of water, proppants like sand and chemicals into wells to dislodge the hydrocarbons underground. The process also forces water out from subterranean deposits.
This water, along with the injected fluids, returns to the surface as produced water. This year’s conference theme, The Water Balancing Act, delt with this specific issue. Oil wells in the Permian Basin produce more than 6.6 million barrels of crude daily, but they produce four to five times that amount in wastewater.
Most of that water is shunted back underground through injection wells, while up to 50% is recovered and recycled for further drilling. Further research is being done for beneficial reuse of treated produced water. Texas Tech agriculture researchers, Texas Produced Water Consortium and TAWC member producers discussed and held a field tour to help the oil and gas industry better understand how agriculture currently uses water daily in the Permian Basin.
At the Borgstedt Cattle Company, a 200-head cattle and club calf operation about 100 miles south of Lubbock, Samantha and Brandon Borgstedt showed the oil industry visitors how treated produced water is applied to their land. The field tour also highlighted the farming practices of Jeremy Louder of 2J Farms and Bryan Creech of Creech Farms, all TAWC members.
Samantha Borgstedt, who serves as TAWC’s Project Director, explained that the visitors viewed how closely intermingled the agriculture and oil and gas industries are throughout Martin County. Cotton fields, ranches, saltwater disposal wells, and water pits are side-by-side through the county. Water, both rainfall and groundwater, in this area has always been the limiting factor to number of cattle a rancher can run or yield a farmer can make.
“Once treated, the produced water is of higher quality than some well water in the region, and did not have a negative impact on alfalfa growth and quality,” said Krishna Jagadish, director of the Davis College Water Center at Texas Tech. His team is studying how treated water affects plant physiology and root development across cotton, sorghum and forage crops. Early findings, he said, suggest cautious optimism.
Founded with state support nearly two decades ago, the TAWC brings farmers, scientists and agencies together to extend the life of the Ogallala Aquifer, the underground reservoir that has sustained High Plains agriculture for generations but is rapidly declining. On-farm demonstrations, overseen but not directed by Texas Tech, are central to its approach.
The debate over produced water has intensified since 2021, when the Legislature created the Texas Produced Water Consortium (TXPWC) to examine the economic, environmental and health implications of reuse. Housed at Texas Tech, the consortium convenes regulators, researchers and oil companies to explore potential pathways.
CONTACT: Samantha Borgstedt, Project Director, Texas Alliance for Water Conservation, Texas Tech University at (806) 789-4177 or samantha.borgstedt@ttu.edu
0827NM25