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Oklahoma Corporation Commission outlines staffing gains, warns of oil-well plugging shortfall
Summary
The Oklahoma Corporation Commission told the legislature it used last year ppropriations to hire inspectors and cut wells-per-inspector by about 10%, but said federal grant requirements and the scale of abandoned wells mean the state still faces a multi-hundred-million-dollar plugging gap.
Brandy Reath, director of administration and executive director for the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, told the House appropriations subcommittee the commission used additional appropriations last year to hire more field inspectors and reduce the caseload per inspector.
"We have around 175,000 active oil wells," Reath said. "That brought down the number of wells per inspector by about 10%" and "they each have around 2,279 well sites on average they're responsible for." She thanked the legislature for the support that funded the hires.
Reath described other agency priorities, including cross-training field staff to handle utility and pipeline issues, expanding emergency-response coverage at ports of entry, and a new drone…
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