Company Partners With Coal Industry to Provide Water For Fracking | Video

Jennifer Joas | 7/25/2012

With 20 to 30 million gallons of water needed per day to frac wells in North Dakota, more and more companies are jumping at the chance to provide that water. One company is partnering with the coal industry to make it happen.

Every well needs two to four million gallons of water per day for the fracking process. Typically, companies truck the water to the wells and then heat the water on site. But several companies are now providing hot water at depots to eliminate the extra step.

"It saves them energy. It`s greener I think. There`s a smaller carbon footprint to it obviously and it`s just a lot safer," said Phil Gisi, President/CEO of Edgewood Group of Companies.

SBG Energy Services is one of those companies. It`s partnering with Headwaters Resources Incorporated to provide hot water through Great River Energy`s power plants near Stanton and Underwood.

SBG will provide three million gallons of water per day first by truck, and then by pipeline.

"We feel the industry is going towards pipelines. So fresh water pipelines would be utilized more and more to carry water to a lot of these developing fields. Which makes a lot of sense because the fields themselves and the producers are becoming much more efficient. They`re doing more wells per pad, the spacing is going to be more efficient," Gisi said.

SBG plans to open the water depots near Stanton and Underwood in September.

SBG is finalizing design work for the pipelines, and hopes to have those running by 2014.

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