Absentee Landowners

[cakadu]

In the past several weeks, I have noticed more and more drilling activity in our area and judging by the way the drilling is happening i.e. right beside the secondary highway I would hazard a guess that is for methane. I'm wondering if the short term gain being offered by the gas companies will offset the long-term pain that allowing all of this drilling activity to occur may bring. Not that I am questioning why producers and/or landowners are allowing it - it is money that they are not otherwise going to see.

What I am more concerned about and wondering how many of you have to deal with the fact that often the right-of-way being granted is being done by landowners who do not have to put up with the consequences of allowing the companies onto their land. We have a situation where people who own land near us live in Calgary and they just lease the land out. They have allowed, and continue to allow all kinds of drilling activity on their land. The problem that I have with it is that they don't have to live with all the rigs moving in and out, the noise from the drilling activity and the potential harm that being done to the environment. If the drilling company does not do the reclamation in a timely manner, then they don't have to live with that either.

I don't know if there is a solution for this type of thing, but do any of you have a solution or know of someone who does?

The proliferation of drilling outfits, particularly for methane, doesn't seem to be a problem but things like first parcel out and/or development rights are?

[grassfarmer]

Absentee landowners are a different group !! In all referrals on applications for development within municipalities all absentee landowners must be circulated to ensure they have no objections etc.
I remember one case where a man and his wife had divorced, she got one parcel of land he got the other, and wouldn't you know he was working overseas....no known address except the local one, so the application for rezoning adjacent land was allowed to proceed. HE returned from his work away from the area and appealed the decision, hauled in lawyers and the municipality backtracked to change the zoning !!!

I would suspect that in your area there are many absentee landowners that are or have purchased land on spec and are just waiting an opportune time to develop it or sell it and make a fast buck. The oil resource activity is just a cash cow by the look of it.

[cowman]

Well Linda, don't know what to say! They own it they can do what they want with it. I know where you are coming from though...it is sad to see a bunch of carpetbaggers buy up the land and they don't give a rip about the land or the community!
I believe in your area the methane activity basically took place last year...these were mostly exploration wells...the big production push will come later!
Right now in your area there is a lot of activity but it is not for coalbed methane...it is actually shallow conventional gas.

[cowman]

cowman, any areas of conventional gas will see a lot of activity over the next few years. In many of the older fields there are no pockets of conventional or sweet gas so the buzz word is sour oil wells....and the mention of that raises the hackles of communities.

[cakadu]

I understand and agree cowman, they do own it and can do what they like, but that doesn't always make it right, does it?

The landowners in this case grew up around here - at least one of them did.

The sad fact is that far too many landowners are in the unenviable position of needing quick money and will sign.

I've heard some of you talk about all the miles of pipeline - what will it mean from an environmental standpoint if all this new activity goes on, all this habitat has to be disrupted and/or permanently altered to allow for the drilling and the resulting pipelines etc?

Cowman, can they directional drill for methane and/or sweet gas? I know that they do for oil but I'm wondering if the wells for gas are deep enough that it would be worth it to directional drill?

I get more and more concerned about what the cumulative affects of all of this are going to be. Like with many things, just because we can do it, should we be doing it?

[cowman]

Linda: They can directional drill for sweet gas or coalbed methane. The reality of the situation, however, is coalbed methane doesn't produce a lot of gas and the economics of directonally drilling are just not there. It costs considerably more to directional drill.
Conventional gas is another story! When I talk about shallow conventional gas that can mean around 1000 meters or right into the Belly River formation. The Belly River light crude is about as good as it gets and the gas wells tend to last a long time. A decent shallow conventional gas well would produce close to 5 times as much gas as a coalbed well!
Frankly if the coalbed gas was subject to the same restrictions that conventional is, there would never be a coalbed well drilled.

[cowman]

Linda, the avereage individual really doesn't take the time to get informed about all the pros and cons of resource activity. Surface Rights groups have formed across the province and some of them are excellent at providing information, speaking at workshops etc., however, some are radicals and really lose their credibility very fast.
Martha Kostach has done work with various environmental groups, I am not sure if she has done much investigatory work on the issues surrounding the pursuit of coalbed methane or not, but it might not hurt for you to give her a call and find out where she stands on these issues and what info she can provide.

[Horse]

Cakadu dont say to much or you will be labeled as a whiner you are not supose to be aware or care what happens outside your fence line .

[Horse]

Horse, I don't think that anyone who takes an interest in what goes on in their community should have any label attached to them. The first thing that people with common sense do is become informed. Sitting back not asking questions and not speaking out if there is a concern certainly doesn't show leadership, and although I don't know Linda, it isn't difficult to realize that she is a leader in her community.

[cakadu]

Thanks emrald.

I know that at least one, if not two, surface rights groups have formed in the last little while here in our county. From what cowman says, the drilling activity is far worse out in the east part of the county than it is in the west - FOR NOW.

As the price of oil and natural gas continues to climb, I think we are going to see both mounting pressure to sign and drilling activity no matter what they are looking for. We won't be able to stop it, but I do hope that we will leave as small a footprint as possible.