New oil and gas regulations protect taxpayers and reflect Montanans’ love for public lands • Daily Montanan

For the first time in over 60 years, the Bureau of Land Management has developed new rules for supervising the development of oil and gas deposits on public lands. These commonsense rules provide the changes needed to protect taxpayers, clean air and water, and protect public health. Oil and gas companies will eventually be required to set responsible bond levels that ensure funds are available to remediate abandoned wells if the companies leave town before cleaning up their messes. As you can imagine, oil and gas lobbyists are not happy with these changes and are doing everything in their power to stop them from being implemented.

It is important that we prevent this.

These rules will protect our 245 million acres of public lands, something Montanans care deeply about. The The survey is conducted twice a year at the University of Montana released last month shows that 70% of Montanans support BLM’s policies that place protection of public lands on par with extractive uses such as oil and gas drilling. So let’s take a closer look at how these updated bond levels align with Montanans’ strong conservation values ​​while protecting taxpayers.

As most of us know, oil and gas companies are required to post a financial bond before drilling a new well. After the well’s production period ends, the owner is obliged to plug it and reclaim the land used. However, if the owner is negligent in this respect, the deposit paid by him will be forfeited and these funds will be used to properly fill the well and recultivate the land. Here’s the problem: The BLM estimates that plugging and remediating the land under a single well could cost up to $100,000 today. The old security amount for a single well was $10,000. Who covers recultivation costs that significantly exceed the amount of the deposit if the well owner leaves? American taxpayer. And if taxpayers don’t foot the bill, degraded public lands, environmental and public health hazards will remain.

It is no wonder that so many well owners decide to give up places where production is no longer carried out – it is much cheaper. Taking inflation into account, a $10,000 bond amount deployed over 60 years ago would be valued at over $100,000 today. And that $100,000 amount is exactly what the BLM has identified as new bonding requirements for a single well. This isn’t rocket science. These rules simply reflect today’s costs and place the responsibility for cleanup right where it belongs – on the oil and gas industry.

Oil and gas companies say only a few orphan wells are on public lands, so we don’t need these new protections. In fact, thousands of idle wells are located on public lands that are likely to be orphaned as they sit unused for many years. The developers of these wells will probably abandon them because – as noted earlier – it will simply be more economical for them to waive the bonds. Importantly, these “inactive” wells often contribute to environmental degradation, emit dangerous methane pollutants, pose safety risks, and adversely affect surface waters. Once again, new regulations requiring responsible bond amounts will encourage oil and gas companies to clean up our public lands after extraction.

Finally, let’s look at how these rule updates impact leasing. Over the past decade, the BLM has offered competitive lease sales for more than 40 million acres. Of this amount, about 10 million were actually leased – most by oil and gas companies. Of this amount, only about 7% generated revenue for the government from oil and gas royalties. In addition to increasing the royalty rate paid to our treasury, the new rules will ensure that the bidding process protects public lands on par with the mining industry, a policy that is consistent with the values ​​of the vast majority of Montanans.

These new rules are long overdue and reflect BLM’s true mission to protect and effectively manage our public lands.

Edward Barta is a Billings resident, retired teacher, landscape photographer, avid fisherman and president of the Northern Plains Resources Council, a grassroots conservation and family farming group.