How Dying Gas Wells Are Making One Company Rich

Don't miss the first part of this Storylines series about Texas Oil Country's Invisible Secret: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62rkNvfuTlg

I would be shocked, truly shocked... if I found out that oil and gas companies provided seed money for diversified, and then sold their "assets" to Diversified.... I can't think of a more profitable and efficient way to get these liabilities off their books.

CEO named "Rusty". Oh the irony.

I grew up in Ohio and we often found gas leaking from the ground on it's own when hiking through the areas of Ohio. My friends father was a Chemical engineer and said under Ohio and other states there were huge amounts of gas and just leaks out on it's own.

She says there is an explosion hazard as she stands there in a T-shirt. You are not allowed on any well site without long sleeve flame resistant clothing. We have to wear it all day every day even when it’s 100 out

Almost all of these leaks can be fixed by taking a few hours to disassemble the piping and re doping the joints. It is not hard or costly. They could have a few people just do this every day for a year or two to fix all the wells. I have dealt with gas piping as a maintenance tech. They would probably even make money by increasing the yield of the wells too.

I heard about a family that had a low producing well on their property. They used that well to heat their home, hotwater and used it for their cooking stove. I thought how lucky is that? Yearly they saved a ton of money on the cost of maintaining their home. Especially with the cost of oil and gas today.

I bought the rights to the well on my property. It's not commercially viable, but it does have enough to supply all of my current consumption for about another 150 years. It didn't need to be plugged. It needed some of the joins resealed. Any area with gas will have trace methane releases, with or without a well. The "90 dollars" is if the technician is onsite. If the repair tech has to hike a five hour round trip into the woods to get to it, it's not "90 dollars". Compelling a gas company to plug producing wells would be a great way to drive up gas prices and reduce supply though. The gas being produced at the wells also generates revenue to pay for roads and schools in the states, so plugging them would plug that too.

Something else I found out.. My friend owns a large working farm that a pipeline goes across his property.. The gas company has a big metal building with a type of control center.. My friend discovered gas was leaking into some of his wells and ponds… He and the gas company went back and forth for years.. Gas company comes and checks everything every so often

As a engineer you don’t have to plug wells to stop leaks. You just need to rebuild the well systems (pipeline) and use stainless steel that will last for years and never Break down over time like iron pipes do. It’s not hard to shut a well off and rebuild it. Can be done it a matter of days on larger well. Hours on smaller wells.

I think that Diversify is a shell company to which other companies sell exhausted gas pumps in order not to pay for their closure.

I was waiting for just how much this company is “getting rich”. They could be breaking even or even losing money for all we know.

I dont know if it already have been done but it would have been wise to let make every company that drills wells a fund for each well from which the plugging can be paid off. If the well goes to an other owner, the fund does too but cannot be used for something other than plugging the well. This ensures that there is always money to close that wells

I inspect natural gas wells for an air district in California. The FLIR IR camera only finds large leaks. I prefer to use an Eagle 2 analyzer it is much cheaper than the FLIR ($7,000 vs $90,000) and detects much lower emissions of methane (I am trained to use both devices). The Eagle 2 also gives a quantifiable reading in ppmv and it is hand held unlike that contraption the professor was using. People in the comments think Diversified is a shell company but I seriously doubt it with my experience with the oil and gas industry. Natural gas prices have dropped over the years so most producers shut-in their wells and or sold them. Some companies buy up these old wells gambling that gas prices will go up again in the future and they will put them back into production. They are simply buying cheap hoping for a favorable future to get a return on their investment. I have seen a similar trend in my area as well one company has bought up most of the local well leases.

Classic example of privatise profits, socialise costs. They will go bankrupt after using those wells, just as they need to be plugged. And every one known it. The policy makers just don’t want to deal with it yet, the shareholders are enjoying the dividends and the CEO a fast pay packet.

This is the type of news I like seeing investigative reporting and for something that will help generations after us. Great content

My father worked in an oil refinery, and once he fixed a low pressure leak on his home gas meter piping by just smearing over the joint with some jointing compound. He said that they used to do it at work all the time.

It's no joke, the same problem in Canada, thousands of swells need to plugged. I used to do it, it's a job that will be in high demand if we get our act together.

Anyone else look up the share price of diversified energy!! Down 20% today as this video was published lol 😀😀😀

My great aunt had a well on her property that was sold to her for only like 200 dollars. It wasn't hooked up to the line but made enough gas to heat her house, gas dryer, water heater, and her stove. She bought it back in like the 70's and it died about 4 years ago. She was going to have to pay to plug it but the state bought her property for a high way project and they will be plugging it now. She got a lot of use out of it until it died. My brother has one close to his place that I have no idea who owes but it's not hooked to anything and it's not far off the roadway. It's so old and no idea when it would of been used last. I grow up in the house he lives in and I was born in 1976 and I don't recall it ever being hooked to anything. No idea who owes it or if anyone owes it. these are in Pennsylvanian