Petrochemicals - TX

Pump jacks sit idle on a South Texas ranch near Bigfoot. Deserted drilling wells are the relics of every oil bust, and Texas is pitted with more than any other place in the U.S.  Eric Gay/AP

dallasnews.com - by Chris Siron - The Associated Press - by Paul J. Weber - June 19, 2016

The worst oil bust since the 1980s is putting Texas and other oil producing states on the hook for thousands of newly abandoned drilling sites at a time when they have little money to plug wells and seal off environmental hazards.

In Texas alone, the roughly $165 million price tag of plugging nearly 10,000 abandoned wells is double the entire budget of the agency that regulates the industry.

The state's regulators want taxpayers to cover more of the clean-up, supplementing industry payments.

As U.S. rig counts plunge to historic lows, and with at least 60 oil producers declaring bankruptcy since 2014, energy-producing states are confronting holes in their budgets and potentially leaking ones in the ground.

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Photo: El Paso Times - (CLICK HERE to view additional photos)

texashillcountry.com - by THC Staff - May 6, 2016

The recent Texas flooding has overwhelmed oil wells and fracking sites, overflowing crude oil and chemicals into rivers statewide.

With the onset of storms finally subsiding, state officials have begun to assess the entirety of the damage caused by the flooding that occurred across the state.

As KIII reported, “state emergency management officials have taken dozens of photographs that show sheens and plumes spreading from tipped tanks and flooded production sites” of the Sabine River flood on the Louisiana-Texas border.

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CLICK HERE - kiiitv.com - Flooding Flushes Oil, Chemicals into Texas Rivers

Large hoses lead from one hydraulic fracking drill site to another as horses graze in a Midland, Texas field.
Photograph: Pat Sullivan/AP

reuters.com - by Anna Driver and Terry Wade - May 18, 2015

Texas Governor Greg Abbott on Monday signed a bill into law that prohibits cities and towns from banning an oil drilling practice known as hydraulic fracking, giving the state sole authority over oil and gas regulation.

Lawmakers in Texas, a state that is home to the two of the most productive U.S. shale oil fields, have been under pressure to halt an anti-fracking movement since November, when voters in the town of Denton voted to ban the oil and gas extraction technique.

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FILE - In this Tuesday, Oct. 14, 2014, file photo, oil pumps work at sunset in the desert oil fields of Sakhir, Bahrain. Oil prices have further to drop with no signs of slowing production in the U.S., according to the International Energy Agency, Friday, March 13, 2015. (AP Photo/Hasan Jamali, File) - Associated Press

ABC News - AP - March 13, 2015

Oil prices have further to drop with few signs of slowing production in the U.S., according to a global energy agency.

The International Energy Agency, a watchdog group based in Paris that represents the world's main oil-importing nations, said in its monthly report Friday that the recent stabilization in oil prices is "precarious."

"Behind the facade of stability, the rebalancing triggered by the price collapse has yet to run its course," it said.

That may be playing out right now. Oil prices tumbled 10 percent this week, including a 5 percent drop Friday.

The IEA cautioned that risks of oil supply disruptions are growing. Low prices could raise the risk of social disruption in some countries dependent on oil, the agency said, and the ongoing conflict in Iraq and Libya hasn't slowed down.