National Park Service let go its last engineer who monitored abandoned wells, which pose a 'significant threat'

Unplugged oil and gas wells can still spew noxious gases 
and pollute groundwater. (Adobe Stock photo)

Forrest Smith was the National Park Service's sole engineer tasked with finding and cleaning up the roughly 93 abandoned gas and oil wells scattered across federal lands. But in September, the NPS chose not to renew Smith's contract, leaving no one to track leaky wells. Old, unplugged wells can pose a "significant threat to the environment and public health," reports Maxine Joselow of The New York Times.

Often dubbed "orphaned wells," most forgotten sites were drilled and abandoned before the "national parks were established," Joselow explains. Orphaned wells can continue to spew noxious gases, such as methane, a greenhouse gas, and benzene, a chemical "linked to leukemia and other blood cancers. . . . .Oil and brine can seep from the wells into aquifers that supply drinking water to nearby communities."

Inactive and orphaned wells will continue to pose an unseen threat because the NPS lacks employees to monitor sites and make arrangements to have them sealed through a process know as "plugging". Beau Kiklis, associate director of energy and landscape conservation at the National Parks Conservation Association, told Joselow, "I don’t think I can underscore enough that this has been a significantly underestimated public health and safety problem." 

Smith estimated that there are "around 2,500 inactive wells on Park Service lands, including 93 that are orphaned. Of those abandoned wells, about 70 are leaking methane," Joselow reports.

A spokeswoman for the Interior Department, which oversees the Park Service, told the Times that "the Park Service 'has made strong progress in meeting the administration’s priorities to identify and plug orphaned wells on park lands,' and that 'staffing levels naturally fluctuate as appointments conclude and new positions are filled.'"