The state's drilling and fracking frenzy is raising questions about safety, earthquakes and water use. That's raising the stakes for this year's race for an open seat on the three-member Railroad Commission.

Texas regulators on Tuesday tightened rules for wells that dispose of oilfield waste, a response to the spate of earthquakes that have rattled North Texas.

Nordheim, population 307, is the site of one of the first organized protests in the heart of the Eagle Ford. Many of its residents are fighting to keep out a massive disposal facility for oil and gas waste — a sight that could become more common as energy producers search for places to dispose of their leftovers.

In their efforts to regulate the wells that hold Texas' oilfield waste, state officials have found a surprising ally in the federal Environmental Protection Agency, long a political punching bag in Texas. Support for the plan, expressed in a letter this month, provides a glimpse of the behind-the-scenes collaboration between two agencies whose relationship often appears icy.

Oil and gas activities – but not hydraulic fracturing – tainted drinking water wells atop North Texas’ Barnett Shale and Pennsylvania’s Marcellus formation, according to a new study. High levels of methane escaped poorly constructed natural gas wells and migrated into shallow aquifers.

Texas Railroad Commissioner David Porter on Monday became the second of the state's three oil and gas regulators to raise concerns that Russia is waging a misinformation campaign against hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking.

Texas should not bank on legal action to free it from the Obama administration’s proposal to tackle climate change, two officials with state regulators said Friday at a Public Utility Commission workshop, during which state regulators, industry representatives and energy experts wrangled with the complexities of the EPA proposal and debated how Texas should proceed.

The Railroad Commission's new chairman on the agency's dual role as an industry watchdog and champion, the push to ban fracking in Denton and the commission’s efforts on earthquakes and disposal wells.

Texas regulators have proposed new rules aimed at clearing up confusion about which pipelines are "common carriers" — a status that gives pipeline companies the right to claim private property using eminent domain. Pipeline operators oppose stricter regulations. Landowners say they want fair offers for their land.

A North Texas town's effort to ban hydraulic fracturing may prompt an unprecedented showdown between two powerful rights: a city's authority to shape development inside its borders, and mineral owners' right to tap their resources. The outcome could reshape Texas law at a time when drilling is causing tension in some urban areas.

Voters will decide whether Denton will become the state's first city to ban hydraulic fracturing after the city council rejected a proposal to ban the method of oil and gas extraction involving blasting apart rock with millions of gallons of chemical-laced water.

Responding to questions about whether fracking has pushed methane to migrate into a North Texas neighborhood’s water supply, the Railroad Commission of Texas last month effectively shut the door on its investigation, saying that oil and gas drilling was not to blame. But independent geoscientists remained divided on the issue.

While Barnett Shale gas producers deny any connection between methane-contaminated wells and their operations, a pair of scientists dispute that.  They say test results just released by state regulators provide concrete evidence of a link. 

UPDATED: The Railroad Commission on Thursday sided with Marathon Oil Company’s bid to dismiss a groundwater conservation district’s protest of its application to inject waste into part of South Texas’ Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer.

Railroad Commissioner Barry Smitherman lost his bid for attorney general, but he remains an oil and gas regulator and has sought industry help retiring campaign debts and perhaps landing a job. The potential for conflict may turn heads, but it's not an unusual situation, and Smitherman supporters say he is an ethical operator.

A former Texas Railroad Commission chairman is helping Ryan Sitton fight back against conflict-of-interest allegations in the Republican primary runoff for an open seat on the commission. Meanwhile, Sitton is redirecting ethics questions to his opponent, Wayne Christian.

The Texas Railroad Commission has hired a seismologist to research the oil and gas industry's ties to the spate of earthquakes that has rattled North Texans.

Ryan Sitton (bottom right), a Republican candidate for railroad commissioner, says that if elected, he would remain involved with his company, which consults with some of the world’s largest oil and gas companies. Some of his opponents have raised concerns.