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The Texas A&M University System hosted a one-day workshop of key industry experts to discuss how to reduce the environmental impact of operations in the Eagle Ford Shale recently at the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Institute on the campus of Texas A&M University-Kingsville.

The meeting was aimed at landowners, operators, public officials and the general public and its purpose was to discuss new technology designed to protect ground water resources, keep track of emissions and reduce impact of oil field lease roads.

Attendees of the workshop learned how environmental engineering plays a role in gas shale drilling, such as how to drought-proof South Texas communities.

The workshop was a collaboration between several A&M System entities including: the Texas Engineering Experiment Station (TEES), the Texas Center for Applied Technology (TCAT), the Global Petroleum Research Institute (GPRI), the Energy Engineering Institute (EEI), the Texas Engineering Extension Service (TEEX) and the Institute for Sustainable Energy and the Environment at TAMU-Kingsville.

"The Environmentally Friendly Drilling program at Texas A&M is an example of a successful interdisciplinary project extending through multiple colleges," said David Burnett, director of technology of the GPRI. "All have a common aim to bring science-based solutions to oil and gas field operations."

Members of the Environmentally Friendly Drilling System program at the Houston Advanced Research Center displayed a mobile water treatment and desalination laboratory and a mobile "micro-grid" providing electrical power from alternative energy sources to support field operations.