Texas A&M University's  Petroleum Engineering Department Global Petroleum Research In­stitute and its partners are working to find ways  to reduce the impact of oil and gas drilling and production prac­tices in environmentally sensitive areas. One of the possibilities would be to position well sites on land surfaces to minimize environmental impact.

One of the EFD's most promising approaches is to use biophysical hydrologic models developed in agriculture to determine the impacts of oil and gas field development on water quality and the landscape. These models could  provide a tool to evaluate environmental impact from drilling and recovery prior to operations.

The Agricultural Policy/Environmental eXtender (APEX) small watershed model and the Soil & Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) riverscale model are being adapted by the Texas AgriLife Research and Extension Center at Temple to examine impacts of drilling activity on the fate of water, sediment, nutrients and chemicals at multiple scales from fields to watersheds.

Examples of the models in use are being developed by A&M. More information can be obtained by contacting the project's managers.

http://sites.google.com/a/pe.tamu.edu/optimization-models-for-surface-placement-of-o-g-drill-sites/Home/contact-information