Most of the surface land affected by the impending drilling is owned by individuals like members of the Walkup and the Conley families, who have little houses scattered across the radius of the drill sight. Some lots are owned by Hardeman County or Quanah ISD (they hold a lot of foreclosed land; that’s how I purchased my lot). A Diesel Service station and the Quanah High School Stadium are located on neighboring blocks.
The permit application includes several stipulations intended to protect the environment. The Railroad Commission of Texas issued a “Groundwater Protection Determination” that in these locations: “The interval from the land surface to a depth of 250 feet must be protected.” They have permission to dig to a depth of 9,500 feet, so just the top portion is protected. If there is any chance the water supply can be contaminated, obviously this would be the deadliest threat to the residents of the city.
The question that I asked immediately upon hearing this proposal was if fracking was involved. The answer to this was “no,” but then I found a set of forms in the packet with the heading, “Hydraulic Fracture Stimulation using Diesel Fuel.” The term “fracture” seemed to suggest that fracking or fracturing with potentially dangerous materials was involved, but as I read this form now I realize that it is part of a standard Railroad Commission of Texas “Permit to Drill” form. It forbids “Hydraulic fracture stimulation using diesel fuel” without a suitable permit. The execs from Palaura interrupted most of my questions by saying that I did not know enough on the subject to press them further on the details of the type of drilling they were planning. Obviously, I only had minutes to quickly research the subject on my phone at the time, but here is some information I learned since.
There are some unexpected potential problems related to oil drilling. Time featured a story about the spike from one earthquake in Oklahoma in 2007 to 907 earthquakes in 2015, more 3-plus earthquakes than in California.1 Oklahoma City is one of the closest major cities to Quanah, so the oil boom and the problems that come with it can have seismic repercussions on this region as well. Time pointed out that it has been 300 million years since “Oklahoma’s faults were last active”, and yet that there are 0 “seismologists currently employed by the state.”
The administrators of the oil company drilling in Quanah were surprised by even the question of doing an environmental impact analysis prior to drilling. The attitude towards drilling is similar in Texas and Oklahoma: environmental or otherwise scientific research is seen as a hindrance to business growth rather than as a potential safety net against catastrophically bankrupting earthquakes, spills and other disasters. Scientists would also be significantly better at finding the most likely locations for oil reserves, so avoiding them is counter to business interests. Time explains the relationship between oil drilling and earthquakes: “disposal wells, which inject back into the earth the salty wastewater that comes to the surface alongside oil and gas, have been lubricating the fault lines buried deep beneath the prairie floor,” making them shift and quake. A similar pattern might be seen in Texas if its oil production becomes more densely concentrated in any given region. Even a 4-quake is likely to demolish my new, uninsured, small manufactured home, which shakes even when wind speeds are above 30mph.
In contrast to these stark findings, a study of a potential rig in Hermosa Beach, California, has found that oil drilling would have few “negative health outcomes” other than those that are “nuisance-related” in areas of odor, noise and light emissions and aesthetics, and the potential for well blowouts. On the other hand, this same study states that “uncontrolled, project-related chemicals in storm water runoff could be detrimental to the environment and human health.”2
This study also found that the location was previously used as a landfill, and that this might cause exposure to high levels of lead from the soil. Perhaps a study of this caliber is expensive, but a miniature version of it surely might help prevent a blowout or other disasters unexpected from only a surface viewing.
The difference between California’s and Texas’ oil policies is explained in the conclusion to a study of Los Angeles’ oil boom and bust: “In Louisiana and Texas, oil companies wrote state oil conservation regulations to slow oil production and stabilize prices. Conflicts between large and small oil firms defeated similar conservation regulations in California, even though these