Texas Mineral Watch → methodology

Where the data comes from

Every number on this site is built from public records published by the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC), the state agency of record for oil & gas. We compile and structure them — we don't originate them.

Current source vintage: permits 2026-07-10 · completions 2026-02-13 · well status 2026-07.

The four RRC feeds

🛢Drilling permits (W-1). The RRC drilling-permit master — operator, lease name, county/district, filed date, permit type (including whether the well is horizontal), surface location, and the Abstract/Survey/Block/Section tract grid. This is our live signal: 12,875 permits, 4,985 in the last year. A new permit near your tract — especially a horizontal well, which can produce minerals a mile away — is how you learn drilling is coming.
⚠️Rule 37 & Rule 38 exceptions (historical). A Rule 37 exception lets an operator drill closer to a lease line than standard spacing allows; Rule 38 covers well density. The RRC stopped publishing these flags in the permit feed in mid-2024, so we hold 3,371 on record through then but do not alert on new ones — the live drainage signal is the new drilling permit above.
✅Completions. The RRC completion filings — when a well is completed, its type (producing / shut-in), and the API↔lease bridge back to production.
📇Wellbore query. The standing cross-reference of API number to lease and lifecycle status (producing, shut-in, plugged). 1,006,559 wellbores, 223,303 producing.
📈Lease production. Monthly oil & gas volumes by lease from the RRC production query — bounded to a recent window in this version.

What our coordinates mean

activity is mapped to the permit surface location the operator filed with the Railroad Commission — not the mineral tract you own; the RRC records coordinates in NAD27 and disclaims their precision, so treat every map point as approximate.

We never claim to have located your mineral tract. We map activity — the surface location an operator filed with the RRC — and tell you when it's near a location you describe. Confirming what you own is a job for a title opinion or a landman, not a data feed.

How current it is

Permits refresh daily; completions and well status refresh on the RRC's cadence; production refreshes monthly. Each page shows the vintage of the records behind it, and our alert engine only advances its marker past activity it has actually processed — so we never imply the data is fresher than it is. If a source feed is stale or broken on a given run, the run is skipped loudly rather than reported as a fresh, empty result.

This report compiles and structures publicly available oil & gas records from the Railroad Commission of Texas — drilling permits, completions, well status, and lease production. We monitor development activity and public filings near a location you tell us about; we do NOT determine mineral ownership, confirm what you own, or provide legal, tax, or investment advice. Nothing here replaces a title opinion, a landman, or reading the official RRC filing. Activity is mapped to the operator-filed permit surface location (NAD27, precision disclaimed by the RRC), not your mineral tract. Data is current only as of the source vintage shown on the page. Our total liability for any report is capped at the amount you paid for it. Found an error? Reply to any email and a human will correct it.