North Dakota Contends With Impact Of Energy Boom

A produced water and oil spill hit North Dakota in September.

The North Dakota Oil and Gas Division said workers "contained 500 barrels of water and three barrels of oil after a spill in the state's northwest corner," according to the Associated Press. "The water is used in hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting oil and gas."

"Officials blamed the spill on a tank overflow," the International Oil & Gas Newspaper reported.

North Dakota has experienced an energy boom in recent years, according to Governing magazine. Companies have been attracted to the state in part because of the Bakken formation, a rock unit underlying parts of the state.

"While oil companies have been drilling into the Bakken for 60 years, a few factors have converged recently to bring a frenzy of new activity to the area. For one thing, new technologies involving hydraulic fracking and horizontal drilling have made it possible to extract oil from rock as thick as concrete," the report said.

Mineral rights are another factor.

"The high price tag of those techniques means they’re only economically feasible now that the price of a barrel of crude oil hovers around $100. Oil companies are now rushing to tap the ground before the cheap pre-boom leases they signed with mineral rights owners expire," the report said.

The state is contending with some challenges as a result of the energy boom.

"Oil and Gas workers in North Dakota are three times more likely to get killed on the job than those who work in other states. That's according to an investigation done by Inside Energy, an independent journalistic cooperative focusing on the energy industry. North Dakota's fatality rate is the highest taking into account the number of people who work in the industry," KXNews recently reported.

In February, an energy company in North Dakota leaked fracking wastewater and oil from a well, raising concerns about groundwater contamination and other environmental hazards, Water Online previously reported.

For more oil and gas news, check out Water Online's Produced Water Solution Center.