[texbirds] Re: Drought and no rivers - but any birding reports?

  • From: Ruth Friedrichs <twofried@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "segast23@xxxxxxxxx" <segast23@xxxxxxxxx>, "spkelley@xxxxxxxxx" <spkelley@xxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Thu, 12 Sep 2013 11:38:53 -0700 (PDT)

Dear TexBirders:
 
I have to agree with Steve regarding this string getting a bit off topic.
 
While water use and water conservations is extremely important (and very 
emotional) during this time of extreme drought, and we should certainly all do 
our part to conserve and get involved in making the situation better..... 
I'm wondering is there is a birding report out there :)  They help get me 
through the week.  
Thanks very much, 
Bob Friedrichs
Houston



From: Stephen Gast <segast23@xxxxxxxxx>
>To: "spkelley@xxxxxxxxx" <spkelley@xxxxxxxxx> 
>Cc: "sueorwig@xxxxxxxxx" <sueorwig@xxxxxxxxx>; Brush Freeman 
><brushfreeman@xxxxxxxxx>; Joseph Kennedy <josephkennedy36@xxxxxxxxx>; 4 
>Texbirds Maillist <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> 
>Sent: Thursday, September 12, 2013 1:17 PM
>Subject: [texbirds] Re: Drought and no rivers, 
>
>
>This is beginning to go seriously off-topic from Texbirds charter, but I will 
>post one factual accounting and then go offline if anyone wants to discuss 
>further, they can e-mail me directly. I have researched water usage in Texas 
>and have come up with the following data from public sources - my sources are 
>given in each case. 
> -  8,388 new oil and gas wells
>completed in 2011 in Texas (Texas Railroad Commission Data) There were 15,060
>wells drilled in 2012 but I didn’t find water data for 2012. 
>- Approximately 41 billion gallons of water used in
>completion of the these wells using an average of  5,000,000 gallons per well
>if every well was a fracked well (which a significant number were not) (average
>water usage from Frac Focus website)
>- This gives a conservative (over-estimated) total usage of
>128,800 acre feet of water (conversion factor of 325,851 gal/acre-ft)
> 
>From the Texas Water Development Board - 2011 statewide
>water use statistics in acre-feet
>25,674,681 Private/public
>11,082,577 Irrigation
>  4,866,918 Municipal/government
>  1,098,095 Manufacturing
>     472,097 Electric power generation 
>     311,703 Livestock
>     267,400 Mining (includes fracking as well
>as all other mining operations) (equals 87 billion gals.)  Of these acre-feet 
>155,475 a/f was from
>subsurface (water wells/aquifers), and 111,927 a/f from surface sources. 
>A lot of the frac drilling in Texas (maybe 2/3rds or more) is
>in dry regions with little or no surface water, so typically water wells are 
>drilled if necessary (although water is trucked a lot also). My contacts in 
>the oil industry
>say that ranchers like the companies to drill water wells since after the
>companies finish drilling and fracking the oil/gas wells, then they have a
>free water well for their livestock or irrigation purposes.  This could be 
>seen as enabling expanded
>aquifer drainage, but no rancher will refuse a free water well in this current
>climate. 
> 
>Steve Gast
>Houston, Texas
>segast23@xxxxxxxxx
>Edit your Freelists account settings for TEXBIRDS at 
>//www.freelists.org/list/texbirds
>
>Reposting of traffic from TEXBIRDS is prohibited without seeking permission 
>from the List Owner
>
>
>
>
>
Edit your Freelists account settings for TEXBIRDS at 
//www.freelists.org/list/texbirds

Reposting of traffic from TEXBIRDS is prohibited without seeking permission 
from the List Owner

Other related posts:

  • » [texbirds] Re: Drought and no rivers - but any birding reports? - Ruth Friedrichs
  1. Home
  2. texbirds
  3. Archive
  4. 09-2013