Petro Waste Environmental acquires landfill permit in Howard County

San Antonio-based Petro Waste Environmental LP (PWE) has announced the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC) has issued the company its first permit to operate a non-hazardous oil and gas waste landfill in Howard County. The permit is one of several the company has pending for landfill sites in DeWitt, Frio, McMullen, and Pecos counties.

"This is an exciting, positive development for our company and an important step toward our goal of locating a PWE facility within 30 miles of all drilling activity throughout the Eagle Ford Shale and the Permian Basin," said Petro Waste Founder and Chief Executive Officer George Wommack.

The exploration and production (E&P) of oil and gas creates various forms of waste that must be processed and disposed of according to strict regulations set by the RRC and the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). New extraction techniques have increased the volume of non-hazardous solid wastes and high solids content waste fluids: these consist primarily of high solids content frack flow-back water, and oil-based drilling muds and cuttings. Until recently, there has been a lack of infrastructure capable of efficiently processing and disposing of these waste streams near the drilling sites. Consequently, it has been necessary to truck large quantities of the wastes over long distances to the few existing facilities capable of accepting the materials.

Petro Waste Environmental is addressing this infrastructure shortage. The company has been constructing RRC-permitted waste-processing and disposal facilities that are strategically located throughout the Permian Basin and the Eagle Ford Shale. An exclusive alliance with Pyote Water Systems (PWS) allows PWE to use PWS' saltwater disposal facilities and build some of PWE's solid-waste disposal units adjacent to them. As such, PWE is one of few companies equipped to dispose of all non-hazardous oilfield wastes onsite within the bounds of the Permian Basin and the Eagle Ford Shale.

In order to maintain high standards of safety, Petro Waste is working with the best engineering firms to create state-of-the-art facilities using world-class technology, including high-tech automation and monitoring systems that supplement the functions of onsite personnel.

"The oil and gas waste-processing industry has progressed significantly in recent years, and Petro Waste is aligning itself to meet the new challenges," added Wommack. "Going forward, we anticipate an even higher level of engineering standards in facility design and the construction of more institutional-quality facilities, as environmental stewardship becomes more of a focus for our industry today than ever before."

Edited from press release by Angharad Lock

Read the article online at: https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/petrochemicals/19112015/pwe-issued-landfill-permit-in-howard-county-1646/