Abstract

There are hundreds of thousands of “orphaned” oil and gas wells in the US that have no solvent owner, emit methane that contributes to global warming, and pose other environmental and health hazards. However, there are large uncertainties related to many aspects of this issue, including the physical location of hundreds of thousands of wells, the extent of methane emissions and other environmental hazards, and the costs associated with decommissioning these sites. This presentation will describe those uncertainties, recent estimates on the costs and benefits of decommissioning wells, and assess a variety of policy options to reduce future risks.

Speaker: Daniel Raimi, Resources for the Future and Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan.
Moderator: Elena Verdolini, University of Brescia and RFF-CMCC European Institute on Economics and the Environment, Italy