PA Environment Digest Blog: EDF: US House Passes Bill To Locate Abandoned/Orphaned Conventional Oil & Gas Wells, Improve Well Plugging Technology

On April 30, the US the House of Representatives passed the Abandoned Well Remediation Research and Development Act by a vote of 333 to 75. The bipartisan bill now moves to the US Senate, where it is expected to also receive bipartisan support.

“Orphaned oil and gas wells threaten public health and safety, the water we drink and the climate,” said Environmental Defense Fund director and senior attorney for energy transition Adam Peltz. “This essential bipartisan bill will fund the research necessary to improve well plugging practices, find unregistered orphan wells in hard-to-reach places like streams, forests, farmland and backyards, and develop beneficial clean energy uses for end-of-life wells. This bill will create jobs and benefit public health, particularly for communities overburdened by legacy oil and gas development – and now the Senate should take up this bill so that President Biden can sign it into law.”

This important bipartisan legislation would invest more than $150 million over the next five years to help find an estimated 800,000 undocumented orphan wells, reuse those we can for beneficial purposes and ultimately close the rest more effectively and affordably.

AWRRDA provides funding to research how to improve well plugging, locate undocumented orphan wells and study potential uses for both orphan and end-of-life wells.

While responsible well operators promptly plug their oil and gas wells when they run dry, many orphan wells have been improperly abandoned for decades or more.

Hard-to-reach locations coupled with unknown well architecture, crumbling steel casings and unexpected objects downhole like telephone poles, rolled up carpets and even cannon balls make orphan well plugging especially challenging.

(Written by Adam Peltz, Director and Senior Attorney, Environmental Defense Fund)

Resource Link:

-- Congressmember Summer Lee: House Passes Bipartisan Abandoned Wells Remediation, Research And Development Act

Resource Links:

-- Shapiro Marks Plugging 200th Abandoned Conventional Oil & Gas Well: These Companies Will Do Anything To Avoid Paying For Plugging; It’s Not Okay Some In The Legislature Are Shielding Them; Text Well Locations [PaEN]

-- DEP Imposed $422,365 In Penalties On 14 Conventional Oil & Gas Well Operators In 2023 For Abandoning Wells, Spills, Venting Gas; 93 Operators Cited For Abandoning 271 Wells [PaEN]

-- DEP: 89% Of Conventional Oil & Gas Well Owners Did Not Comply With Well Integrity Reporting For 34,455 Wells In 2023 [PaEN]

-- DEP: 86% Of Conventional Oil & Gas Well Owners Did Not Comply With Waste Disposal, Production Reporting For 33,505 Wells In 2023 [PaEN]

-- EDF: Pennsylvania Has 55,000 Oil/Gas Wells At High Risk Of Being Abandoned; 51,000 Wells At Risk Of Being Transferred To Low Solvency Owners; Current Conventional Well Owners Abandon 561 Wells A Year, On Average [PaEN]

-- DEP Declares 101 Medina Res Dev Co. LLC Conventional Oil & Gas Wells Abandoned, Not Plugged In Crawford, Erie Counties On March 5 [PaEN]

-- Witness At Senate Hearing On Oil & Gas Wastewater Road Dumping Reports Her Home Has Been Surrounded By Dumping; Dumping Again On The Upswing In 2024 [PaEN]

-- DEP Reports ZERO Shale Gas Well Permits Under Review; DEP May Have Only 20% Of The Revenue Needed To Fund Its Oil & Gas Regulation Program [PaEN]