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Florida House Passes Bill That Could Breathe Life Into Area’s Old Oil Wells
February 16, 2012
The Florida House passed legislation Wednesday that could breathe life into old oil wells in the North Escambia area.
Sponsor Matt Hudson, R-Naples, said his seeks to “rejuvenate” oil fields that were discovered decades ago but have been abandoned. At least in some cases, he said active wells are operating near the abandoned sites.
“If producers decide to tap into those abandoned wells, without question it will create jobs,” Hudson said recently.
The bill puts as low as a 1 percent severance tax on oil from the abandoned wells, instead of the current 8 percent severance tax rate. It applies to old oil fields in the western Panhandle and in the Big Cypress Reserve in southwest Florida. The measure passed the House 80-36, with most Democrats opposing it.
One of the dissenters, Rep. Jeff Clemens, D-Lake Worth, said he had questions about where the abandoned wells are located and the potential environmental effects of tapping them.
Though drawing relatively little attention, Florida has long had oil production in the northwest Panhandle, and in parts of Southwest Florida. Most of the oil wells are in the Jay area, but many are in extreme northeastern Escambia County east of Century and north of Highway 4.
A House staff analysis said the Panhandle fields produced about 1 million barrels of oil in 2010, while the Southwest Florida fields produced about 775,000 barrels. The Jay Field, including some Escambia County wells, produced 993,841 barrels in 2010.
The House bill targets fields that were discovered before 1981 and that would begin producing oil after July 1, 2012.
It would not lead to offshore oil drilling, a highly controversial issue in Florida. Earlier this year, Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann drew criticism when she raised the prospect of opening up the Everglades to oil drilling, though backers of the idea noted that it wasn’t that far from some of the drilling already going on in Southwest Florida.
The House analysis says 16 oil fields were discovered in Florida before 1981, with seven of them plugged and abandoned. Nine of those abandoned wells are in Northwest Florida, most in the North Escambia area.
Pictured top: This map shows the wells in the Jay Oil Field. Pictured inset: The oil and gas from the Jay Field is processed by Quantum Resources in Jay. NorthEscambia.com photo, click to enlarge.
Comments
7 Responses to “Florida House Passes Bill That Could Breathe Life Into Area’s Old Oil Wells”
Yes! We need job in this area. Those that oppose , must have a job.
The tax breaks are specifically because Quantum Resources closed the well in 2007. Wanna know why? So you could continue to have cheap gas and petroleum products….the field was shut down because it was stated that the prices of the oil in the ground were too low to continue running some of those Oil Rigs. It was determined by the final cost of each barrel pumped that it was cheaper to import.
This incentive is an effort to defray the cost of getting the resources out of the ground. It’s been over 40 years now since that oil field was discovered, and according to what I’ve read over the years, it’s either 30-40% depleted. Which means there’s still quite a bit of oil in that field. We don’t have 50 posts stating this is a bad idea because it’s not. There’s been no significant environmental impact at any of these sites (studies are actually available with simple google searches), the only reason the oil stopped flowing is because after the bills were tabulated it was determined oil could be had cheaper from overseas than in our own back yard.
We need the jobs, Need to lower fuel cost, Need to get North Escambia back to work. Families will benefit from this. Whats the problem? Oil Spill, Much better on land than sea. Cant disspurse & sink it on land. Have to clean it up. More jobs. Drill !
We could all use the jobs, What good are oil wells if we dont use them . We drill for water, Natural gas. Why not oil? Need our oil prices to go down & income to go up. An oil spill on land is way better than on Water.
Some of those capped wells are on property that Gulf Power just purchased.
Oops, sorry Doug. Here, let me try:
NO!
. . . NO!
. . . . . . . . NO!
Keeping those evil corporations from getting tax breaks is FAR more important than providing jobs or improving energy independence or not funding international terrorists.
David trying to maintain straight face
I’m shocked. This story has been posted for more than 10 minutes and we don’t have 50 posts as to why this is a bad idea. Are Floridians finally starting to realize that it takes more than fishing, farming, and the military installations to sustain our economy?