State and US officials tout spending to plug 'orphan wells'

ATCHAFALAYA NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE, La. (AP) — Stacks of valves, networks of pipes and hulking, two-story-tall tanks litter parts of the swampy landscape of Louisiana’s Atchafalaya Basin, rusting relics of sites where oil wells were drilled in the 1970s, an unwanted legacy of the energy industry that has long helped drive the Louisiana economy.

They are among an estimated 2 million unplugged U.S. “ orphan wells,” abandoned by the companies that drilled them. There are more than 4,500 such wells in Louisiana, according to the state Department of Natural Resources. The owners can’t be found, have gone out of business or otherwise can’t be made to pay in a state where there are decades-long political debates involving legislation and litigation over the environmental effects of oil and gas drilling.

The Biden administration plans to tackle the problem nationally with $4.7 billion from the bipartisan infrastructure bill passed in late 2021. Administration officials joined their state counterparts in the Atchafalaya National Wildlife Refuge recently to tout the efforts.

“The state and federal government, we are left to clean them up because of the hazard they present,” Martha Williams, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said. She was visiting what is known as the B-5 well site with Thomas Harris, secretary of the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources., and Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Secretary Jack Montoucet.