Project to uncover abandoned wells in the Mon Valley

Environmental Defense Fund and Moms Clean Air Force, alongside contractors, will be working in Charleroi and other areas to identify undocumented orphan and abandoned oil and gas wells.

Residents in Charleroi and nearby communities might start seeing drones and on-foot inspectors with backpack magnetometers in their neighborhoods, but don’t be alarmed — they’re looking for abandoned and orphaned wells.

The Environmental Defense Fund and Moms Clean Air Force are partnering to identify undocumented orphan and abandoned oil and gas wells in Charleroi and other areas. Their project focuses on parcels of land in Washington and Allegheny counties, identified with the assistance of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.

Both Adam Peltz, director and senior attorney for EDF, and Patrice Tomcik, senior field director for Moms Clean Air Force, said that Western Pennsylvania is riddled with abandoned wells, which can be unsafe for the environment and people.

Peltz said a lot of the wells were built and then abandoned before regulatory laws were in place, which led to no documentation of how many there are or their location. Now many of these wells remain unplugged and houses, businesses and many other things were built around them or on top of them.

“Western Pennsylvania has the single largest concentration of these wells anywhere in the U.S.,” Peltz said. “It’s believed there are around 25,000 documented, but it’s believed that there could be over 300,000 undocumented.

“Buildings have been built in and around and on top of these wells, which pose a potential safety risk, in addition to groundwater contamination, air toxics like benzene. It’s not great to have an undocumented orphan well within and around where you live.”

An abandoned well close to a house could also pose an explosion risk, according to Peltz. For example, if gas from a well is allowed A1

to migrate into a closed space like a basement and it builds up to a certain concentration level, it could become explosive.

Peltz added that a study done in Pennsylvania found that over 70% of abandoned wells tested had benzene emissions, which is a known carcinogen.

Beginning this month, EDF and Moms Clean Air Force will begin searching for abandoned wells using cars equipped with special sensors, on-foot inspectors, and drone-mounted magnetic sensors that can detect the metal casing in old wells, even if they are not visible at the surface. The project is expected to last until the fall.

According to Peltz, the cars with special sensors will be able to detect methane and ethane. The goal is to be able to distinguish between different sources of gas.

“So gas that comes from an old well will have a different chemical signature than gas that comes from a distribution line, or biogenic gas from microbes in the soil, or landfill gas, and that sort of thing,” Peltz said. “So we’ll be able to know where it seems like there are spikes in gas and what the source likely is.”

On-foot inspectors will be walking around with something that might look like a leafblower in a backpack, which will use groundbased magnetometry to scan areas with methane spikes. If an on-foot inspector determines there might be a well nearby, they might knock on the door of a homeowner and ask for permission to go onto their property to get a better reading.

Peltz said that the drones will fly at around 100 feet to map the subsurface, looking for magnetic anomalies that might indicate the likely presence of a well. He added that they’re doing the drone surveys in limited areas and that they’ve sent letters to the homeowners in those areas to inform them and give them the opportunity to opt out.

Peltz said that they expect to do these surveys in North Fayette Township, Ross Township, Shaler Township, White Oak, Charleroi, and South Strabane.

Once they identify the wells, they will contact the DEP, which will send out inspectors, do a survey on them, and put them on the DEP well database. Peltz said they will also be posting information on their EDF website and will try to contact landowners if there is a well on their properties.

“Once the wells are in the DEP database, they can be put out for bid for well pluggers to come and plug the wells, and it’s a process which could take some time,” Peltz said. “Although historically, there’s been very little money in the Commonwealth to plug these wells, only a few emergency wells a year. But the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which was passed in 2021, included $4.7 billion for well plugging, of which 400 million is allocated to Pennsylvania, and that money continues to flow, and there are hundreds of millions of dollars heading into the Commonwealth to pay for accelerated well plugging.”

Despite the new funds for well plugging, Peltz said that the issue is so vast that $400 million isn’t going to solve the issue. But he added that it’s a start and that by finding the wells, there will be a case for additional funding to do the work.

Community outreach

According to Tomcik, Moms Clean Air Force has been engaging in community outreach to inform the communities they serve about their mission and the risks that abandoned wells can pose.

“Benzene has a whole host of really big health issues,” Tomcik said. “It’s a potent neurotoxin, which can impact the nervous system, it can impact the respiratory system, the immune system, and contribute to low birth weight.

“So, plugging these is really important, and so we want the public to understand what the issues are, and along with stray gas methane, stray gas seeping into various areas can cause an explosion risk. So we’re just trying to educate the public on the issue and what’s coming.”

Tomcik said they’ve sent out letters to the landowners of the areas they want to survey, and have also sent organizers to the communities to post fliers and door hangers. They’ve also been advertising open houses in which they inform people about the wells and their project.

“Last week was down in Charleroi, but we also had open houses in South Strabane, in South Fayette, and also in Ross Township,” Tomcik said. “So we want that dialog. We want to answer any kind of questions.”

Tomcik reiterated what Peltz mentioned about the number of abandoned wells in Pennsylvania and said that the state needs more funding to take care of them. She asked that residents contact their elected officials to encourage them to support programs that work on locating and plugging wells.

Tomcik said she also wants to assure residents that they’re in their communities to help and take care of an issue that is a hazard.

“We are very respectful, we’re here to help and we want to protect the community,” she said. “We want to protect public health and safety, and that’s why we are out there utilizing drones, the cars and also people on foot.”

Workforce development

The search for abandoned wells also brings additional workforce development opportunities, especially for well-plugging jobs.

According to Peltz, the recent increase in funding for abandoned well remediation projects has provided an increase in plugging demand. Private operators have also begun to try to plug the wells themselves, which has created more need for workers.

Peltz added that there are efforts in Pennsylvania to create plugging apprenticeship programs to get more people into the industry.

“Wells plugged with federal funds pay the workers like, $100,000 a year or more, and they can do good, beneficial work in their communities and go home at night to their families,” Peltz said. “And it’s generally the case that well pluggers are local, and so the majority of the workforce for this effort will be drawn from the communities where the wells need plugging.”