Here’s a bit more from the top of the story. – Molly
“Sarah Stogner plucked a piece of cement off a rusted steel pipe jutting from the ground on a West Texas ranch. The chunk, part of the plug for a long-dormant oil well, crumbled in her hand.
Stogner manages the Antina Ranch, which spans an old oil field southwest of Midland. Today, it’s dotted with abandoned wells, many of which were plugged long ago to prevent the wells from polluting the air and water. Stogner and ranch owner Ashley Watt have found more than 100 failed plugs and are battling Chevron in court over their cleanup.
“You can see the gas bubbles coming up,” Stogner, an oil and gas attorney, said as she watched water puddle atop a plugged but leaking well in December.
Some plugs fail because the cement used to seal them has deteriorated, or the metal well casing has corroded. Petroleum geologists say wastewater disposal from the fracking boom—particularly in the oil-rich Permian basin—could also be pressurizing aquifers beneath the old wells, forcing plugs to blow.
Nobody knows for sure, or how big the problem could be, because few people are watching.
Abandoned oil and gas wells often pollute groundwater and leak methane into the atmosphere, helping to drive climate change. Congress approved $4.7 billion in the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law to plug them, but there are no state or federal requirements to revisit those plugs and ensure the wells aren’t leaking.
States have already documented about 131,000 orphaned wells, which are abandoned wells whose owners went out of business or for which there are no records. Federal regulators estimate the actual number could be 3.5 million.
There’s no consensus on what should happen after they’re plugged. Some scientists and analysts say long-term monitoring is needed. The Interior Department recommends that states monitor up to 5% of the wells they’ve used federal infrastructure money to plug, but few do.”
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Here’s a bit more from the top of the story. – Molly
“Sarah Stogner plucked a piece of cement off a rusted steel pipe jutting from the ground on a West Texas ranch. The chunk, part of the plug for a long-dormant oil well, crumbled in her hand.
Stogner manages the Antina Ranch, which spans an old oil field southwest of Midland. Today, it’s dotted with abandoned wells, many of which were plugged long ago to prevent the wells from polluting the air and water. Stogner and ranch owner Ashley Watt have found more than 100 failed plugs and are battling Chevron in court over their cleanup.
“You can see the gas bubbles coming up,” Stogner, an oil and gas attorney, said as she watched water puddle atop a plugged but leaking well in December.
Some plugs fail because the cement used to seal them has deteriorated, or the metal well casing has corroded. Petroleum geologists say wastewater disposal from the fracking boom—particularly in the oil-rich Permian basin—could also be pressurizing aquifers beneath the old wells, forcing plugs to blow.
Nobody knows for sure, or how big the problem could be, because few people are watching.
Abandoned oil and gas wells often pollute groundwater and leak methane into the atmosphere, helping to drive climate change. Congress approved $4.7 billion in the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law to plug them, but there are no state or federal requirements to revisit those plugs and ensure the wells aren’t leaking.
States have already documented about 131,000 orphaned wells, which are abandoned wells whose owners went out of business or for which there are no records. Federal regulators estimate the actual number could be 3.5 million.
There’s no consensus on what should happen after they’re plugged. Some scientists and analysts say long-term monitoring is needed. The Interior Department recommends that states monitor up to 5% of the wells they’ve used federal infrastructure money to plug, but few do.”
[Read more of the story here. ](https://news.bloomberglaw.com/environment-and-energy/failed-oil-well-plugs-are-silent-polluters-that-no-one-watches)