PA Environment Digest Blog: DEP Pursuing Federal Funding To Further Define Human Health Impacts Of Abandoned Conventional Oil & Gas Wells

Tuesday, March 19, 2024

DEP Pursuing Federal Funding To Further Define Human Health Impacts Of Abandoned Conventional Oil & Gas Wells

On March 19, DEP advised the Oil and Gas Technical Advisory Board the agency is pursuing funding through the US Department of the Interior to get a “really good understanding” of some of the human health impacts of leaking, abandoned conventional oil and gas wells.

Interior administers the federal Abandoned Well Plugging Program funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

Kurt Klapkowski, DEP Deputy Secretary for Oil and Gas Management, said in 2022 DEP worked with PSE Healthy Energy to conduct a study of 48 abandoned conventional wells in Western Pennsylvania and sampled the wells for hazardous air pollutants.

“There were some issues there in terms of the levels of especially benzene that we were seeing in some of these wells,” said Klapkowski. “So we felt like it might be important to try to put something like that together [a follow-up study].”

He said the results of the study were published in the peer-reviewed journal ACS Omega in May 2023.

“The discussions are at a very preliminary level at this point, but the Interior Department did confirm to us that as long as we did the study and it was intended to try to help us prioritize wells, particularly for those communities that are identified in the Infrastructure Act as disadvantaged or underserved and prioritizing well-plugging projects in those areas that we could go through a funding process to do that sort of work,” said Klapkowski.

“It's obviously something that's going to need a lot of conversation around with our partners at the Department of Health and others.

“But, I think that's something that I want to put on the table so that we have a really good understanding of some of these specific human health impacts that may be something that's caused by an improperly plugged or an unplugged abandoned well in close proximity to population areas,” said Klapkowski.

On June 6, 2023, Inside Climate News reported on the results of DEP’s study highlighting the wells were releasing benzene, a cancer-causing chemical, at air concentrations of 250 parts per million-- 250,000 times the California safety standard.

The study analyzed air samples for 27 different chemicals.

About one-fourth of the wells were located within 100 meters of buildings, including residences. Read more here.

“Having grown up in Washington County, some of these abandoned facilities were kind of like background noise there. I think that, my guess is, that most folks in Washington County probably live a lot closer to an abandoned well,” Klapkowski added.

“I do try to remind folks that these facilities, generally speaking, are not being maintained in the field. So even wells that aren't causing problems today, we do know that these facilities will continue to deteriorate,” said Klapkowski.

“And the potential for a future methane migration case and public health and safety issues, the potential for brine [wastewater] releases or hydrocarbon releases getting into the soils and the surface waters of the Commonwealth really does exist for all of these facilities,” explained Klapkowski.

For more information on Board activities, visit DEP’s Oil and Gas Technical Advisory Board webpage. Questions should be directed to Todd Wallace, at twallace@pa.gov or (717) 783-6395.

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