Rising demand for sand is a result of more wells being fracked and more sand being used per well. Analysts indicated the number of frac wells in the U.S. now totals 10,600, up 28 percent from last year but still well below the 19,790 wells in 2014.
“We are running pretty much full time, back to 24 hours a day,” said Sharon Masek, manager of mine planning and industrial relations for Superior Silica Sands in Wisconsin. “We’re pretty much back to our peak levels of employment.”
That means employment at Superior Silica’s five mines in Barron and Chippewa counties has reached close to 200, up from about 70 last year when two of the facilities operated part time and two were completely shut down, Masek said. The company, based in Fort Worth, Texas, is seeking to further boost its western Wisconsin workforce in the coming weeks.
The buzz of activity is refreshing after a tough 2016.
“It’s great,” Masek said. “I love coming to work in the morning when there are trucks all over the place and it’s tough to find a place to park.”
I keep HEARING bad things about it, but I have yet to SEE any conclusive evidence that it's any more harmful than a lot of other things that we seem willing to tolerate.
ReplyDeleteYou mean fracking? I'm sure it has it's down sides - nothing is perfect or cost free - but so far the rewards appear to far outweigh the costs.
DeleteForget "environmental Harmful". Not a big deal. The real big deal is a strong " American frackin" will wean the U.S. off the Arab oil tit.
ReplyDeleteI predict the environmental weenies will go ballistic pretty soon when Trump announces the US will NOT be adhering to the Paris accords. It will probably supplant "Russian Collusion' as the headline story.
ReplyDelete