However, waterflooding still occurs frequently in southeastern New Mexico. However, the Salado Formation and its marker beds are located both at WIPP and at Hartman's well. The Salado Formation is where the blowout occurred. There are disagreements between Dr. Bredehoeft and the EPA on how far a hydrofract would go. LEFM is an accepted model used by the oil industry.
Blowouts still occur in southeastern New Mexico despite regulations and monitoring.
In particular, many leaks are associated with water flooding. Oil operators in one field put together a committee to deal with blowouts because it is such a widespread problem. The leaks usually are of large quantities of fluid. If injection is made at high pressure and the fluid encounters a marker bed, a crack can be created, which increases the permeability of the marker bed by 5 orders of magnitude. If pumping continues, the fracture may extend almost indefinitely.