Shallow Injection Capacity in the Permian Basin: Pressure Limits, Legacy Wells, and Leakage Susceptibility

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Presenter

Dr. Katie Smye
Principal Investigator of the Center for Injection and Seismicity Research
Bureau of Economic Geology
Jackson School of Geosciences
The University of Texas at Austin

Description

Shallow disposal is now the primary strategy for produced water management in the Permian Basin region. With deep disposal linked to elevated earthquake rates and curtailments in Seismic Response Areas, shallow disposal grew 60% from 2021 to 2025, from 3.3 to 5.2 billion barrels (Bbbl) per year, and now accounts for 81% of injected volumes. As shallow injection reservoirs pressurize, impacts of injection are becoming more frequent and consequential. They include surface flows through legacy wellbores, ground-surface uplift, added intermediate casing strings, and well control issues while drilling. We assess remaining shallow injection capacity, identify high-risk legacy wells, and map leakage susceptibility using three CISR pore pressure models, six pressure-limit cases including the RRC 2025 Permian Basin Disposal Well Review, and approximately 300,000 Texas wells benchmarked against present-day cement and plugging standards. Results indicate that the Delaware Mountain Group in the Texas Delaware Basin has at most 16 years of remaining static capacity at 2025 rates, and the Midland Basin San Andres about 33 years in some scenarios. The RRC legacy-well rules reduce capacity by 16–28% in the Texas DMG and 54–75% in the San Andres, where old wells are concentrated. Leakage susceptibility layers for pressure, seal vulnerability, and legacy wells were tested against 256 documented incidents and leaking orphaned wells. Areas where two high hazard layers coincide cover 2.8% of the Texas Permian but contain 30% of documented events.