Paper No. 190-1
Presentation Time: 1:35 PM
ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS AND OPPORTUNITIES OF ORPHANED OIL AND GAS WELLS IN THE UNITED STATES (Invited Presentation)
KANG, Mary1, BOUTOT, Jade2, MCVAY, Renee C.3, ROBERTS, Katherine4, JASECHKO, Scott5, PERRONE, Debra6, WEN, Tao7, LACKEY, Gregory8, RAIMI, Daniel9, DIGIULIO, Dominic C10, SHONKOFF, Seth B.C.11, CAREY, J. William12, ELLIOTT, Elise G.13, VORHEES, Donna J.13 and PELTZ, Adam14, (1)Civil Engineering, McGill University, 817 Sherbrooke St. W., Room 492, Montreal, QC H3A0C3, CANADA, (2)Civil Engineering, McGill University, 817 Sherbrooke St. W., Room 492, Montreal, H3A0C3, CANADA, (3)Environmental Defense Fund, Austin, TX 78701, (4)Environmental Defense Fund, San Francisco, CA 94105, (5)Bren School, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2400 BREN HALL, SANTA BARBARA, CA 93106, (6)UCSBEnvironmental Studies, 7097 Scripps Crescent St, Goleta, CA 93117-2954, (7)Earth and Environmental Sciences, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY 13244, (8)NETL Support Contractor, Leidos Research Support Team, 626 Cochrans Mill Road, P.O. Box 10940, Pittsburgh, PA 15236, (9)Resources for the Future, Washington, DC 20036, (10)University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, CO 80309, (11)PSE Healthy Energy, Oakland, CA 94612, (12)Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545, (13)Health Effects Institute Energy, Boston, MA 02110, (14)Environmental Defense Fund, New York, NY 10010
Hundreds of thousands of documented and undocumented orphaned oil and gas wells exist in the United States (U.S.). These wells have the potential to contaminate water supplies, degrade ecosystems, and emit methane and other air pollutants. Thus, orphaned wells present risks to climate stability and to environmental and human health, which can be reduced by plugging. To quantify environmental risks and opportunities of well plugging at the national level, we analyze locations of 81,857 documented orphaned wells, out of the ~130,000 orphaned wells documented in the U.S.
We find that >4.6 million people live within 1 km of a documented orphaned well. 35% of the documented orphaned wells are located within 1 km of a domestic groundwater well, yet only 8% of the wells have groundwater quality data within a 1 km radius. Methane emissions from the documented orphaned wells represent approximately 3%–6% of total U.S. methane emissions from abandoned oil and gas wells, but this estimate is based on measurements at <0.03% of U.S. abandoned wells. Although a US-wide dataset of air pollutant emissions from orphaned wells is not available, benzene was detected in ~70% of abandoned oil and gas wells in Pennsylvania. Overall, environmental monitoring data are not extensive enough to quantify risks, especially those related to air and water quality and human health.
91% of the documented orphaned wells overlie formations favorable for geologic storage of carbon dioxide and hydrogen, meaning that orphaned well plugging can reduce leakage risks from future storage projects. Plugging orphaned wells can provide opportunities for geologic storage of carbon dioxide and hydrogen and geothermal energy development, thereby facilitating efforts to transition to net-zero energy systems.
Our analysis on environmental risks and opportunities of orphaned wells provides a framework that can be used to manage the millions of documented and undocumented orphaned wells in the U.S. and abroad. To conduct such national scale studies, there is a need to fill major gaps in the available data on documented orphaned wells, especially those beyond location including well depth, well type, and date of last production.
![[Visit Client Website]](/img/gsa/banner.jpg)