KELLER — North Texans have been eyeing the gas-drilling boom with more scrutiny as rigs, wells and high-pressure pipelines move closer to them, so some drillers have responded with practices that can lessen the impact on people and the environment.

DRC/Barron Ludlum

EnCana Oil & Gas is using a new flexible drilling rig on Johnson Road near Keller. It is quieter, safer and leaves a smaller “footprint” behind.

Even within Keller’s suburban creep, wherever old cattle pastures still stand, drillers shoehorn gas wells in where city setback requirements haven’t closed off access entirely.

In order to drill near U.S. Highway 377 and across from Keller High School, operators with EnCana Oil & Gas sought flexible drilling rigs, a new kind of rig that makes less noise and makes less of an impact on the land.

Flexible rigs took some of their innovation from offshore drilling rigs, and were further refined after drilling in the environmentally sensitive Piceance Basin in western Colorado, said Jim Kramer, an operations field leader with EnCana.

The flexible rigs are the first of their kind in Texas, according to the rigs’ builder, Helmerich & Payne. The two flexible rigs near Keller also use less energy and are safer for workers, Kramer said.

Lance Hardy of Troup has worked on oil and gas rigs for more than five years, both in South Texas and Colorado, before coming to work in the Barnett Shale boom. Now that he works on a flexible rig, he said he’d rather not go back to work on a traditional rig.

The more common, traditional rigs are “a lot harder and more dangerous,” Hardy said. “And I like my air conditioning.”

Hardy electronically drives the driller with a joystick, similar to the operation of a video game. He watches the spinning pipe through a safety-glass window inside a trailer on the top deck of the rig. Computers help monitor pressure and other readings and measurements in the well hole. Meanwhile, other co-workers operate the booms that put the drill pipe in position on the platform.

While there’s still physical labor involved with the new rigs, Hardy said, older rigs are more hands-on than flexible rigs. Workers on older rigs are more likely to be hurt when they are putting the long, heavy lengths of iron drilling pipe into position.

Oil and gas extraction is hazardous work, with 2.6 “recordable incidents” per 100 workers, according to Department of Labor statistics from 2004, the latest year statistics are available. But recordable incidents — such as an injury requiring stitches or being knocked unconscious — are 70 percent lower on flexible rigs, according to Brian Tucker, a field representative with Helmerich & Payne.

Workers get intensive training before going to work on the rig, and overall turnover on the new rigs is much lower, Tucker said. With the different design and the stability, workers can focus on safety and efficiency.

Houston-based Helmerich & Payne built the two flexible rigs EnCana has leased for the next three years in order to operate in Keller and other “high-impact” drill sites in the Barnett Shale. The company can build about four rigs each month, which cost between $12 million and $14 million, Tucker said.

The flexible rigs sit on a track like a railroad car, and slide down the track to reach a new well site.

Dragging the older rigs to a new drilling site costs $50,000 to $60,000 and takes an average of two days. Moving a flexible rig down the track takes about an hour, Kramer said.

In addition, flexible rigs come with loop systems that process the drilling fluids, mud and shale with smaller catch pits. More of the materials to be recycled stay in the tanks and never touch land, making less of an impact on the environment.

“The drilling fluids get recycled into the system and stay cleaner,” Kramer said.

Depending on restrictions at the well site, the dry cuttings of shale are kept in a lined trench until they can be reburied, or all the waste is hauled off and processed.

Flexible rigs are powered by generators rather than diesel motors on the deck of the rig itself, reducing the two main nuisances to neighboring properties — noise and traffic.

The Keller rig was raised in a weekend, following a set of community meetings, and before football season started. EnCana officials reported that so far, no one has complained about the noise.

If not for the reserve pits that operators dig to hold the water required to “frac” the well, gas drilling sites in North Texas could be even smaller. Operators must release the gas from the shale by forcing water and sand into the well. Often, a million gallons of water or more are required to release the gas.

Deborah West, a community relations representative with EnCana, said the company continues to work on water issues. 

“We’re conducting a number of tests and studies on ways to reuse and recycle water,” West said.

PEGGY HEINKEL-WOLFE can be reached at 940-566-6881. Her e-mail address is pheinkel-wolfe@dentonrc.com.