Thousands Of Abandoned Coalbed Methane Wells Across Wyoming; Bonding Not Even Close To Cleanup Costs
Marjorie and Bill West's ranch in Campbell County, Wyo., sprawls across 10,000 acres of hills, rocky outcrops and steep valleys. Their family has run cattle and planted wheat, barley and alfalfa here for 80 years. But when natural gas companies tapped underlying coalbeds, mostly leased from other mineral rights holders, in 1999, artesian wells dried up and cottonwoods drowned in produced water. Today, about 100 gas wells sit abandoned on the property, making it difficult to work the fields and damaging farm equipment. And though none have blown out, neighboring wells have; some still have gas pressure.
Marjorie West partly blames the state, which regulates the industry but also relies on it for revenue. "They don't care about the people who have spent generations farming and ranching," West says. Wyoming has about 1,200 abandoned wells, mainly from a coalbed methane boom that peaked in the early to mid 2000s, when 2,500 wells were drilled annually.
Then the economic downturn hit. As the wells dried up and natural gas prices fell, many smaller operations declared bankruptcy, leaving unreclaimed wells and waste pits behind. Companies pay regulators bonds before drilling, to be returned once they plug wells and restore the surface to, ideally, pre-drilling conditions. Most operators follow through. If they bail, the bonds pay for cleanup. Abandoned wells on private and state land become the state's responsibility; federal-land wells fall to the Bureau of Land Management. But because bonding amounts often fall below the costs of reclamation, agencies sometimes scramble for funds.
With its number of abandoned wells expected to double or even triple within a year, Wyoming has the dubious distinction of having the worst problem in the West, according to Oil and Gas Accountability Project Director Bruce Baizel. In response, the Wyoming Legislature and governor are pushing state regulators to expedite cleanup of orphaned wells and consider increasing bonds and taxes. "Quite candidly," Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission Supervisor Grant Black recently told lawmakers, "I don't believe that the commission has paid as much attention to this as they should have."
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https://www.hcn.org/issues/45.22/the-coalbed-methane-bust-has-left-orphaned-gas-wells-across-wyoming
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