OI LFI E LD WATE R MANAG E M E NT
Gravity’s Hull saltwater disposal (SWD), located in Howard County, Texas, can inject up to 50,000 bbl/day of produced water
back into the earth. However, the company says it has been able to reduce the injection volumes needed at the Hull SWD to
around 21,000 bbl/day thanks to increased produced water reuse projects with E&P companies.

networks and large-scale recycling and water treatment facilities.

Establishing an extensive network of pipelines and treatment
facilities is a key step to creating that circular economy of water
management, which can help to reduce the need to draw from
freshwater aquifers.

“What the Evolution Pipeline System allows XRI to do is move
approximately 500,000 barrels of water per day from the central
Midland Basin — where there remain seismic concerns and
defined seismic response areas — down to Reagan County and
Uptown counties, where XRI owns and operates full-cycle water
infrastructure in the southern portion of the Midland Basin,” Mr
Durand explained. “When we move water to those counties, where
there’s been minimal disposal injection historically, we are trans-
porting significant water quantities up and down XRI’s pipeline
infrastructure, treating the produced water and moving treated
recycled water to operators who want to minimize or avoid dis-
posal throughout the basin.” The company is currently developing
a similar set of projects in the Delaware Basin.

Further, it also hopes to provide financial incentives for E&P
companies to move away from water disposal, by providing
treated produced water for its operator clients at a lower cost per
barrel than the injection of water into disposal wells. “At XRI, we
have always viewed disposal of water as a last resort only, and
that philosophy and practice is not going to change,” Mr Durand
stated. “It is critical that industry continues to embrace recycle
and beneficial reuse as technologies continue to emerge.”
Today, XRI handles almost 1.5 million bbl/day of produced
water , which is treated at one of 30 water recycling facilities
throughout the Permian Basin. “Disposal avoidance will continue
to gain importance as a key metric of success,” he said.

Disposal wells will likely still be important in
foreseeable future
Gravity personnel discuss operations at the Long 350 SWD in
Howard County. The company says its field personnel now
often see up to 100,000 bbl/day of produced water volumes
being shifted back and forth between Gravity’s SWDs and ac-
tive reuse projects, all located on the company’s 500,000 bbl/
day Howard County Super System.

32 Gravity Water Midstream is the water management business of
Gravity Oilfield Services, which also runs a power rental solutions
business. Its water management solutions include high-volume
sourcing, pipeline transport, reuse and disposal through a net-
work of fluid logistics assets and infrastructure. That includes
fresh and brackish water storage pits, produced water gathering
and freshwater sourcing pipelines, and saltwater disposal wells.

The company owns almost 300 miles of pipeline, 53 saltwater
disposal wells, and 12 fresh and brine water facilities with over 6
million bbl of storage capacity. Gravity also has multiple produced
water recycling assets, some of which are mobile and can be
moved around within its system based on E&P activity.

The business is operated in three parts, said Trace Hight, Chief
Commercial Officer of Water Infrastructure. The first is a sourcing
segment that delivers frac water to the field; the second focuses
J U LY/AU G U ST 2023 • D R I L L I N G C O N T R AC T O R