Increase in inactive oil and gas wells could cost Saskatchewan $4B in future cleanup:

[sumdumguy]

Not really abandoned just shut in but you drive around our area and you hardly see any pumpjacks moving these days, must be waiting for better prices but think there is something about the mineral rights and royalties that if you dont use them you lose them?

The same should go for rights that aren’t used. Companies tyed up land forever when they bought the rights for next to nothing and their caveat sits on the title forever, unexercised.

If the land owner grants access and allows a well on his property, maybe he should be responsble for the clean-up? Just wondering. Probably ruffled some feathers there.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Perhaps if all of the useful idiots on the left hadn't postponed or blocked every pipeline proposal, Western Canadian oil and gas would sell on par with World prices, Royalties could justifiably be on par with the rest of the world, Energy companies would still be profitable and in business here, And we wouldn't be having a discussion about abandoned or orphaned wells and who has to pay for it. Perhaps we should send the bill to those who opposed the pipelines, They can try to extract the funds from their financiers Who have profited handsomely from our incompetence to deal with these treasonous obstructionists.

[sumdumguy]

The “left” or “backwards” don’t realize what a big role oil revenue plays in the Canadian economy not to mention everything we do every day. Takes away their cars, their tractors, the thermostat on their wall, there airline tickets - then listen to them whine.

[checking]

GDR

Was your unwanted well ever the result of your accepting seismic money?
Your response, if forthcoming, will determine my sympathy level.

SDG.

11% of landowners have mineral rights. It's their choice to farm them out. Therefore, what you suggest, I find quite in agreement. Most mineral rights owners do not develop their mineral rights themselves, so pick the partner well (pun) if one wants to court you.

[GDR]

GDR

Was your unwanted well ever the result of your accepting seismic money?
Your response, if forthcoming, will determine my sympathy level.

I don't need sympathy at this point
Im over it and life goes on. Just find it backwards that the mineral and property rights are separate and that one can supersede the other.

As for seismic the answer would be yes and no. It did have a sesmic line accross it years ago when i was the renter ( bought the land and built a new yard just before the well came in), dont remember for sure but they would have paid the owner at the time and likely paid some crop damage or something to me. Interestingly enough I caught 2 plastic seismic caps with the drill this spring yo jog my memory on that.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

As I posted in an older thread, I still maintain that the bloated cost of reclaiming old "contaminated" sites is mostly unnecessary, and a bigger environmental catastrophe than the original contamination. It mostly consists of dilution of the contaminant over a larger area, or burying it in a landfill. But in the process, massive amounts of additional fossil fuels are burnt to accomplish this, which requires additional wells to be drilled ad infinitum.

[Horse]

If I member right king Ralph said we don't need royalties we will just tax those high paying jobs and get our money that way. How many of those high rollers bought farmland and really don't know how to farm without that big pay chequer. Some did well as they came from a farm background but others will perish, should we help them out also.

[oneoff]

The same should go for rights that aren’t used. Companies tyed up land forever when they bought the rights for next to nothing and their caveat sits on the title forever, unexercised.

If the land owner grants access and allows a well on his property, maybe he should be responsble for the clean-up? Just wondering. Probably ruffled some feathers there.

Always did have some respect for notsodumbguys comments. Also note that chuckie concedes that oil will be around for a long time.. and for his sake (as well as others who do know where our actual energy sources have come from; will come from until there are viable and better replacements and realize that there is nor need to repeat keep repeating those obvious facts).


But so far I only see the dumb guy pointing out that just maybe the surface owners keen to get their 3K per year and if they are "lucky" get their slice of money from the oil companies for their freehold royalties slice should be held a tiny bit responsible for the existence of necessary oil companies; and maybe a bit of their liabilities caused by some potentially absurd cleanup regulations promoted by even those who may owe their livelihoods to a vibrant oil industry..

Those comments directly pointed at every chuckie in sight.

[GDR]

Yes oil co. should clean up their mess no question. But when complaining royalties are too low you must also consider the other contribution the oil companies pay. They do contribute jobs, wages and corporate taxes also. In our county more than half of revenues come from oil and gas (in theory to make property taxes lower for the rest of us but more likely means the county just spends more). They get taxed on all their facilities and equipment and everytime they do a rig move they pay a flat fee to the county. Big dollars involved. And yes I realize not all areas have an oil and gas industry to tax, just pointing out its not just royalties they pay.

[Happytrails]

As I posted in an older thread, I still maintain that the bloated cost of reclaiming old "contaminated" sites is mostly unnecessary, and a bigger environmental catastrophe than the original contamination. It mostly consists of dilution of the contaminant over a larger area, or burying it in a landfill. But in the process, massive amounts of additional fossil fuels are burnt to accomplish this, which requires additional wells to be drilled ad infinitum.

I'm in 100% agreement with fellow AlbertaFarmer. In many cases the contaminated soil they are removing would just as well be left where it is. We have 60 feet of clay here and zero chance of leeching to ground water. Give the bugs a hundred years and it will be gone. Also there is no consideration of hazard assessment. The most hazardous well locations are being abandoned because they are the most expensive to make safe.

Wellsite reclamation standards attempt to erase all evidence of human activity on old well sites. That is expensive. I could be satisfied with just making them safe for people and animals. Since the railroads can leave their abandoned rail beds in any condition they want and also keep the land they were given maybe the government could spend some money reclaiming them.

[oneoff]

Some very good points for chuck to consider.

Like are the same complaints forthcoming when the royalty benefits come personally compared to someone else or provincial residents?
Similarly is everyone willing to share the extra road traffic etc.past their residence..or do they shift these nuisance effects onto others.

What is one's present stance on new seismographing. Everyone does realize that they have total control of that one aspect of oil development...or it it just "manna" from heaven that clouds the decision regarding entry.

And finally I well remember a fellow who complained his whole life about his oil being produced in times when it was worth $3 per barrell. Wanted his cake in the past and still regretted that it wasn't all still available.

However he was bang on in his assessment about " might as well get oil used up because it would one day just be not necessary". Got a lot of people now believing that.

[the big wheel]

Yes oil co. should clean up their mess no question. But when complaining royalties are too low you must also consider the other contribution the oil companies pay. They do contribute jobs, wages and corporate taxes also. In our county more than half of revenues come from oil and gas (in theory to make property taxes lower for the rest of us but more likely means the county just spends more). They get taxed on all their facilities and equipment and everytime they do a rig move they pay a flat fee to the county. Big dollars involved. And yes I realize not all areas have an oil and gas industry to tax, just pointing out its not just royalties they pay.

Good points but here is sask the increase in activity could not be handled. Roads destroyed, hospitals schools needed more it was all hip hop hooray look at these guys go!! And then one day the bill came due and now we re getting hammered with tax and infrastructure is not even maintained to where it was before because there is more infrastructure.

It all has to be planned out long term not just to get elected next term

Saskatxhewan has no long term plan other than follow oil prices and support any event that raised the price of oil. Which is good for tax revenue but what has it done to prices of goods for everyone else not in the oil industry?
Major hose job. We re paying for some other people to have higher than they should be jobs?