In July, we wrote about the risk of hidden delays for trucks carrying locally sourced frac sand from new plants direct to wells, noting that some challenges are impossible to understand by simply looking at a map. These are things like stop lights, rail crossings, road quality, school zones, left …
Read More »Ghosts Of Frac Sand Past, Present, And Future [Rigs vs. Mines Maps]
Since April, the geo-transformation of the frac sand business has accelerated. In the following charts, we’ve taken our previously published rigs vs. mines cartographical analysis a step further. In the slideshow below, we’ve included a map of historical frac sand supply sources, the new map with three West Texas in-basin …
Read More »Hiccups And Startups – The Very Latest On The First Nine Permian Basin Frac Sand Mines
Three Permian Basin mines are producing frac sand today. Over the next four months, six more plants are planned to begin commercial production in the Basin. Will all go according to plan? And who will win the race to be the next plant online? We have field-level updates on all …
Read More »In-Basin Adversary: 40mph Gusts In Kermit/Monahans Just Tested Sand Stockpiles
High winds ripped through the West Texas dune strip during the past couple days, reminding us of fugitive dust and inventory erosion risks. West Texas poses a unique environmental challenge that the frac sand mining industry has never had to deal with at scale before. We believe wind will be …
Read More »Permian Sand Mine Refresh: All The New Sites In An Excel Download
The Permian frac sand mine story has been moving at light speed. During conversations with several readers this week, we simply paused and marveled at the pace of newsflow in this trend. Even for those of us that keep up with the story very closely, reference points can quickly become …
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