- Workshop Agenda (updated 3/28/22)
You are invited to join the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission (IOGCC) and DOE National Laboratory leadership at an Undocumented Orphaned Wells Workshop on April 5, 2022, from 12 PM EST to 4 PM EST. The workshop will be virtual and free to attend.
Today, there are between 310,000 and 800,000 undocumented orphaned wells in the United States1. These wells pose environmental risks, but efforts to plug them are hampered by the fact that many are in unknown locations and information on their ownership or construction is often missing.
To accelerate the plugging of these wells, the recent Bipartisan Infrastructure Law directed the DOE to collaborate with IOGCC to assist the Federal land management agencies, States, and Indian Tribes in identifying and characterizing undocumented orphaned wells.
To advance this effort, DOE is creating a research consortium that will include DOI, the IOGCC and five National Laboratories to leverage institutional knowledge, existing processes, as well as fundamental and applied science expertise to locate and characterize undocumented orphaned wells. The consortium will focus on determining the physical locations, methane emissions, wellbore integrity, and other environmental impacts of those wells so that they can be prioritized for plugging and abandoning activities by State and Federal agencies.
The Undocumented Orphaned Wells Workshop will bring together regulators, researchers and key stakeholders to discuss the current state of play of undocumented wells. Participants will also explore challenges to finding and characterizing these wells, as well as ideas and solutions to shape the future of research and technology development to mitigate methane and other greenhouse gas emissions from undocumented orphaned wells.
The workshop will include overviews from each organization and four technical sessions to discuss technical needs and requirements for well identification and characterization, potential technology solutions, and intended outcomes of the consortium.
[1] IDLE AND ORPHAN OIL AND GAS WELLS: STATE AND PROVINCIAL REGULATORY STRATEGIES 2021, IOGCC, December 2021, https://iogcc.ok.gov/idle-and-orphan-oil-and-gas-wells-2021.