New saltwater disposal well plan in Nebraska Panhandle becomes a proxy fight over fracking

SARAH HOFFMAN/THE WORLD-HERALD
This wellhead on an out-of-service oil shaft on rangeland about 14 miles north of Mitchell, Nebraska, marks where a Colorado oil company would like to create a disposal well for saltwater that is the byproduct of oil production. The proposal has alarmed many local people opposed to the size and nature of the project.


http://www.omaha.com/news/metro/new-saltwater-disposal-well-plan-in-nebraska-panhandle-becomes-a/article_ac667ca7-09d3-54cd-a827-79b54b18ce25.html

POSTED: SUNDAY, MARCH 22, 2015 1:00 AM
By David Hendee / World-Herald staff writer

How it works: A closer look at the disposal well: http://www.omaha.com/news/nebraska/how-it-works-a-closer-look-at-the-disposal-well/article_bc6408ac-cf56-11e4-a5b2-efdb1b437574.html

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MITCHELL, Neb. — A small Colorado oil company’s attempt to ignite oil and gas exploration in northwest Nebraska has instead sparked a grass-roots firestorm.

Oil field operators commonly use wells to dispose of saltwater that is a byproduct of oil production. But when Terex Energy Corp. filed an application last fall to convert an inactive oil well near this town in the Nebraska Panhandle to a disposal well, the notion rattled many local people.

They didn’t like the size of the project, and they saw it as a looming environmental apocalypse. In the Keystone XL pipeline era, oil and water don’t mix.

Much of the water would come from fracked oil wells in Nebraska, Wyoming and Colorado, and foes of the controversial technique have tried to turn the disposal well issue into a proxy fight over fracking.

FULL story at link.