RRC District 09 (Wichita Falls): counties, drilling permits and how to watch them
District 09 is one of the 13 oil and gas districts of the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC), the state agency that issues drilling permits. It covers 15 counties and is served by the RRC's Wichita Falls district office.
What's in District 09
District 09 covers 15 counties of North Texas around Wichita Falls, along the Red River and south to Denton, Wise and Jack. Eight of them are on the RRC's Barnett Shale list.
Barnett Shale: one of the largest onshore natural gas fields in the United States, designated by the RRC as the Newark, East (Barnett Shale) field and lying in districts 5, 7B and 9. The RRC lists 8 of this district's counties among its affected counties: Archer, Clay, Cooke, Denton, Jack, Montague, Wise and Young.
Counties in District 09
The RRC's county table assigns these 15 counties to District 09. Each name opens that county in Permit Watch:
Archer · Baylor · Clay · Cooke · Denton · Foard · Grayson · Hardeman · Jack · Knox · Montague · Wichita · Wilbarger · Wise · Young
Recent permit activity
From the RRC's monthly summaries of drilling permits, completions and plugging reports processed, for this district:
| 2026 | Jul | Aug | Sep | 3 months |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Original drilling permits approved | 37 | 40 | 26 | 103 |
| of which new drills | 20 | 25 | 20 | 65 |
| Holes plugged | 96 | 98 | 101 | 295 |
Statewide, the RRC approved 2,147 original drilling permits in those three months, so District 09 accounted for about 5% (estimate: 103 ÷ 2,147), ranking 8 of the 12 districts the report lists. "Original" permits exclude amended permits; plugging counts are reports processed, not wells plugged that month. Monthly numbers swing, so use them as a sense of scale, not a forecast.
How to watch new permits in District 09
- Permit Watch: pick a county above to see permits from the RRC's daily drilling permit file, filter by survey, abstract, operator or lease, and subscribe to that county's free RSS feed. Permit Watch is new: until its first daily data load runs, county pages show "first data load pending".
- RRC Drilling Permit (W-1) Query: the official search, listed on the RRC's Research Queries page. The RRC asks that it be used by people, not automated tools.
- RRC Public GIS Viewer: a map of wells and permits, on the same Research Queries page.
In the RRC's daily permit file, the district is the one the operator reported on the W-1 application, stored as an internal code (OGA049M manual).
District office
RRC Wichita Falls office: 5800 Kell Blvd, Suite 300, Wichita Falls, TX 76310. Phone 940-723-2153. Email wichita_falls@rrc.texas.gov. Source: the RRC Locations page.