RRC District 10 (Pampa): counties, drilling permits and how to watch them
District 10 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 26 counties and is served by the RRC's Pampa district office.
What's in District 10
District 10 is the Texas Panhandle: 26 counties from Dallam and Lipscomb on the Oklahoma line south to Parmer, Castro, Swisher, Briscoe and Childress. Every one of them is on the RRC's Granite Wash county list. Over July to September 2026 combined it had the fewest original drilling permits of the 12 districts in the RRC report (23), and six times as many plugging reports (140).
Granite Wash: a tight sand play in the Texas Panhandle (District 10) and western Oklahoma, about 160 miles long and 30 miles wide, at depths of 11,000 to 15,400 feet, developed with horizontal drilling. The RRC lists 26 of this district's counties among its affected counties: Armstrong, Briscoe, Carson, Castro, Childress, Collingsworth, Dallam, Deaf Smith, Donley, Gray, Hall, Hansford, Hartley, Hemphill, Hutchinson, Lipscomb, Moore, Ochiltree, Oldham, Parmer, Potter, Randall, Roberts, Sherman, Swisher and Wheeler.
Counties in District 10
The RRC's county table assigns these 26 counties to District 10. Each name opens that county in Permit Watch:
Armstrong · Briscoe · Carson · Castro · Childress · Collingsworth · Dallam · Deaf Smith · Donley · Gray · Hall · Hansford · Hartley · Hemphill · Hutchinson · Lipscomb · Moore · Ochiltree · Oldham · Parmer · Potter · Randall · Roberts · Sherman · Swisher · Wheeler
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 | 5 | 13 | 5 | 23 |
| of which new drills | 5 | 11 | 5 | 21 |
| Holes plugged | 60 | 36 | 44 | 140 |
Statewide, the RRC approved 2,147 original drilling permits in those three months, so District 10 accounted for about 1% (estimate: 23 ÷ 2,147), ranking 12 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 10
- 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 Pampa office: 200 West Foster, Room 300, Pampa, TX 79065. Phone 806-665-1653. Email pampa@rrc.texas.gov. Source: the RRC Locations page.