Capping One Orphan Well at a Time with the Well Done Foundation

Residents at the Franciscan Village in Cleveland were told they were crazy. Reporting the scent of gas, they called the local utility who said they found nothing and there was no pipeline nearby. This happened repeatedly, the residents reporting the stench of gas to no avail. Until the owner began an expansion on the facility—and discovered an abandoned well in the courtyard. That’s when they called the Well Done Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to plugging orphan wells. 

“Stories like that happen all across the country,” says Curtis Shuck, founder of the Well Done Foundation. Orphan wells are gas wells that no longer have a financially responsible party and have essentially become a ward of the state, he says, or which have been abandoned altogether and will eventually become a ward of the state. By Shuck’s estimation (and the US EPA), there are millions of these across the U.S., and the number is growling. They often leak methane and sometimes oil, threatening water supplies, the environment and communities.

The Well Done Foundation plugged the well at the Franciscan Village—which sat just 30 feet from three different buildings—and their construction project moved forward. And while it might seem like an unusual story, Shuck says it’s one of countless similar tales across the country, like the one in Montana that got him fired up about plugging wells in the first place.

Unable to look away

In Toole County, Montana, near the Canadian border, wide open space is the norm. Recent census data estimate only 2.6 people per square mile. It was there, working with farmers on getting their grain to Pacific ports, that Shuck saw his first orphan well. “I couldn't believe my eyes. I've been involved in the oil and gas industry for 30 years and had never seen anything that crazy before,” he says. “It was just the visual impact and the sensory impact of smelling the gas, of seeing all of the oil field trash that was left behind.” 

Photo Credit: by Jordana Barrack, while onsite in Shelby, MT with the Well Done Foundation

The farmers told him the orphan wells were everywhere in the area—and they felt helpless, that there was nothing they could do about them. Driving home to Bozeman that night, Shuck couldn’t get it out of his mind. He knew he needed to do something. By the time he got home, he’d secured a domain name and registered with the State of Montana. “We had literally no idea what we were going to do,” he says. “But just knew that we needed to do something.”

Since its inception, the Well Done Foundation has plugged 45 orphan oil and gas wells in several states, permanently reducing harmful methane gas emissions by more than 500,000 metric tons of CO2e. The process involves multiple steps, including identifying ownerships and leases, monitoring and testing, closure and finally surface restoration. The work is funded by generous donors and corporate sponsors—and there’s plenty of work to do. 

How did we end up here?

These orphan wells are the result of a “split estate,” Shuck explains. The rights to the land surface and the rights to the minerals below are separated so the person or entity who owns the land doesn’t necessarily own the resources below. For example, a farmer experiencing hard times might sell off the mineral rights to their property for cash at the time—and the mineral rights are preeminent to the surface rights, Shuck says. “So it means that somebody with the mineral rights could then lease those rights, and the leaseholder can go in and essentially drill a well wherever they want, wherever it's permitted, and there's nothing that the landowner, the surface owner can do.”  

Add in several generations of land transfer and we start to lose track of whose name is on title and the associated contact info for accepting responsibility. Prior to the 1950s drilling oil wells did not always require the location to be added to a register, which means today the really old wells are hard to track down on the landscape. Until a farmer or resident complains about it, no one knows it exists. 

Photo Credit: Curtis Shuck, Well Done Foundation

Since the Well Done Foundation began plugging wells, Shuck says he’s seen awareness grow about orphan wells. “For the longest time, they were essentially just everybody's dirty little secret,” he says. “The oil and gas industry didn't want to talk about them. The regulatory agencies didn't want to admit that they were there, because it reflected poorly on their ability to manage the process.” That meant there was also no money for cleanup. But as orphan wells are making it into the news, Shuck says he hopes the Well Done Foundation has helped bring the issue to the forefront and increase financial support to cap the abandoned wells. 

How they’re getting it done

Shuck, based in Bozeman, laughingly says he’s there about 10 days a year. The rest of the time, he says he’s basically living out of his Ford F350 pickup. As a volunteer, he works with a team of 10, all contractors instead of direct staff. “We're in the get-shit-done business, not in the managing people side,” he says. The team is currently working in 14 states and hires local contractors to do the work of capping the wells. “We work with the people from these areas who are familiar with the landscape and know what's going on, and that allows us to have great community relationships,” he explains.

For the team, the work is simple. There’s no policy discussion, no campaigns, just simply raising money and plugging wells. “We've been super fortunate to be supported by some really great folks and some great organizations, such as the folks from Mighty Arrow, and that's really what makes it happen,” Shuck says. He estimates its costs about $70,000 to cap a single well, some costing as much as $150,000, depending on the stakeholders and location. For example, wells in California average closer to $125,000. 

“We always tell people we have a well plugging problem, and we raise money and we go plug wells,” Shuck says. “That's what we do—and as soon as we raise enough money, we'll go plug some more wells.”

Moving forward

Mighty Arrow believes that eventually we do need policy to step in and create more avenues to get these abandoned and orphaned wells identified and capped, and that industry should be an accountability partner in the work. However, stopping methane leaks is low hanging fruit on the list of climate solutions, and we can’t help but be inspired by folks who step up to just get it done. Like this group of students from North Carolina who worked with the Well Done Foundation to adopt and cap a well in Ohio.

When statistics about climate change can feel overwhelming, Shuck says focusing on tangible change can help. “What's cool about our work is—number one—it's very measurable, but number two, every one of these projects is a win and every one produces results.” In addition to financial support, there are other ways to get involved in the process with the Well Done Foundation as well. They offer educational programs, ecotourism volunteer experiences and workforce development, training people to get out and be part of the solution. Mighty Arrow’s team spent a few days in the field with Well Done Foundation in August of 2023 and is grateful for the ability to learn more deeply about this issue alongside Curtis and his team.

For more information about volunteering, to become a member or to learn how to support the foundation, visit welldonefoundation.org.

Photo Credit: Curtis Shuck, Well Done Foundation