Energy company ordered to decommission 300-plus wells for non-compliance

By Medicine Hat News on June 11, 2024.

An oil and gas company has been ordered to decommission more than 300 wells in the Medicine Hat region, among thousands in the province.

The Alberta Energy Regulator announced Monday that Tallahassee Exploration has not complied with orders issued last fall toward submitting a reasonable care and abandonment plan to regulators.

“Tallahassee has not demonstrated it is capable of providing reasonable care and measures to protect public safety and the environment and is unable to meet its regulatory and end-of-life obligations,” read the statement by the AER.

Wells, facilities and pipelines listed in the order number about 2,000 provincewide, including 306 that are handled by the AER’s Medicine Hat field office.

All are currently under the management of the Orphan Well Association for decommissioning.

An inspection of 45 facilities at that time of the September 2023 order found 34 were non-compliant, and the company was required to submit a plan to rectify the situation.

That plan, submitted in January, was considered to be non-compliant by the AER which issued a corporate abandonment order on June 10.

In May, Tallahassee was fined $192,000 by the AER for failing to meet vent gas reporting requirements.