Recap: Alliance for a Clean Texas Legislative BriefingBlog

Alliance for a Clean Texas hosted their first ever legislative briefing and happy hour event on Jan. 29 from 2 p.m. to 7 p.m at the Texas Capitol. The event provided a platform for 14 different climate-centered organizations to present their priorities to legislative staff. Event sponsors included Public Citizen, Commission Shift, Clean Water Action, Sierra Club, Coastal Watch Association, and Air Alliance Houston.

Alliance for a Clean Texas is a coalition of organizations that collaborate and advocate for a safer future for Texans. You can find a full list of participating organizations here.

The event opened with an introduction by Adrian Shelley, the director of Public Citizen Texas, who moderated the briefing. The crowd, a mix of legislative staff and fellow advocates, heard from groups focused on issues related to water, transportation, housing, air quality, solar energy, grid stability, and oil and gas.

Commission Shift policy manager Julie Range presented on behalf of Commission Shift, outlining key policy priorities for the session. A top priority is orphaned and inactive wells in Texas. Orphaned wells are non-compliant, unplugged oil and gas wells with no known operator on file with the Railroad Commission and that have been inactive for at least 12 months. Like orphaned wells, inactive wells have also been inactive for at least 12 months, but they still have a designated operator.

Range highlighted that Commission Shift recommends establishing a limit on plugging extensions to reduce the growing number of inactive wells. The organization also calls for sufficient financial assurance to be required to pay for well plugging.

The Railroad Commission currently spends $15 per foot on average to plug orphaned wells. However, a state law established in 1991 only requires operators to pay $2 per foot to bond an individual well. For example, if a well is orphaned, and the Railroad Commission spends $15 per foot to plug a 10,000-foot well, the total cost will be $150,000. But the agency can only recover a $20,000 bond for the well, leaving $130,000 in unfunded financial risk to Texas.

Commission Shift’s next priority is promoting stronger regulation and guidelines surrounding carbon capture and storage (CCS). Carbon dioxide is heavier than air and can suffocate and cause long-term permanent impairment to anyone who finds themselves caught in a plume from a pipeline explosion or other large leak. Commission Shift wants to ensure operators provide funding for training and needed resources for first responders in the case of a CO2-related emergency. Legislation should also ensure operators retain perpetual liability after post-injection site closure and allow injured parties to make claims for non–economic damages in an accident.

Other priorities include changing the name of the Railroad Commission to a more transparent and accurate name and a focus on ethics reform for the commission, including setting limits on campaign contributions and strengthening recusal requirements for the commissioners.

Lastly, Range briefly touched on waste pits and highlighted the need to strengthen public notice requirements for pits and ensure landowners have the right to informed consent before pit contents are dug into their land.

The briefing closed with remarks from other organizations like Progress Texas and budget concerns from the Sierra Club.

After the presentations concluded, representatives’ staff members and Alliance for a Clean Texas organizations began the successive happy hour. Commission Shift hosted a tabling session at this time to further expand education efforts and connect with attendees.

Do you want to get involved in promoting our legislative priorities? You can start today by contacting your legislators using Commission Shift’s Action Kit. You’ll find everything you need to tell your representatives at the Texas Legislature about orphaned wells and carbon capture and storage.

Reach out to contact@commissionshiftaction.org with feedback, ideas, or questions. We want to hear from you!