Water Use Data Sources for Western Canada

Ponderosa Environmental and Water Resources Inc.

July 8, 2016

Executive Summary

This report has been prepared for the Petroleum Technology Alliance of Canada (PTAC) to research available sources of water use data in Western Canada. Funding was received through the Alberta Upstream Petroleum Research Fund.

The goal of this research is to develop an understanding of the water use data available from public and regulatory domains. In general, regulatory jurisdictions in western Canada have a consistent approach for managing water resources although there are significant differences in the policies, guidelines, and systems utilized for authorizing and tracking water used for upstream oil and gas development.

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) published an annual progress report as part of the Responsible Canadian Energy (RCE) program in 2013 and 2014 summarizing data collected in 2012 and 2013, respectively. The RCE program is designed to track the social and environmental performance of the upstream oil and gas industry in Canada. The publication includes several facts and statistics related to social performance, health and safety, air, water, and land. GEOWA has collected and processed water use data for CAPP dating back to 2009 in order to monitor trends in water use for the upstream oil and gas industry. In 2016 CAPP’s Board of Governors determined that member data collection is not a priority and all elements of the RCE program are currently on hold. In 2014 and 2015 water use data was collected but annual RCE reports were not issued. In an effort to streamline reporting efficiently and improve data capture and quality, CAPP continues to pursue centralization of water data from public and regulatory sources. This report is intended to review existing data sources and processes used by GEOWA and document descriptive information about the data. A secondary objective includes identifying new data sources, documenting the similarities and difference between datasets, and scanning for missing water use information.

The deliverables include a water data catalog providing the available sources of water use data or other data in the absence of water use data. In order to provide context, this report includes water volumes used in western Canada in 2014.

Important findings from this report include:

  1. There are 9 unique data sources currently used by GEOWA
  2. A significant portion of water use data for upstream oil and gas is available through volume reporting systems based on oil and gas production regulations requiring measurement of fluids produced and injected. The Petrinex volume reporting system is used in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
  3. The estimate of water used for drilling and hydraulic fracturing is considerably higher in Alberta as compared to other jurisdictions since it is based on water allocation as opposed to water use for temporary diversion licenses. The majority of this water use information exists and is reported through the drilling and completion requirements under Alberta Energy Regulator Directive 059 although it is not currently available to reconcile the artificially high water volumes.

The recommendations for water data enhancements include:

  1. Refer to the annual CAPP statistical handbook for well counts and oil and gas production data. GEOWA’s production volume data collection can be sorted by CAPP member company, which may have some utility but is not necessary for RCE reporting.
  2. It is recommended that Alberta Environment and Parks establish a working agreement with the Alberta Energy Regulator to submit water use data through WURS from industry-supplied electronic well completion records as per Alberta Energy Regulator Directive 059. This will enhance public transparency without additional reporting burden for CAPP members. It is anticipated that the actual water volume used for hydraulic fracturing in Alberta will be considerably less than the allocated volumes currently reported in RCE.
  3. Perform a periodic audit of the water information gathering process to demonstrate data quality assurance and identify improvements in water use data availability as provincial systems and processes evolve.
  4. Enhance fracfocus.ca to identify the type and source of water used for hydraulic fracturing rather than classifying all hydraulic fracturing fluid volumes as “water”.
  5. Create a detailed data dictionary to define the numerous fields within the Alberta Environment and Parks’ relational water tracking databases, specifically WURS and EMS.

 

Main Body of Report

Technical Appendices

Full Report

# 15-WIPC-08