2023 Summary & Trends - Oil, Gas And Solution Mining
Division of Mineral Resources Annual Report
The New York State Oil, Gas and Mineral Resources 2023 Annual Report (PDF) provides an overview of the oil and gas industry in NY, including permits and well completions, production, state land leasing, underground gas storage, solution mining, and well plugging activities. It also provides an overview of the mining industry and mined land reclamation in NY, including mine types and permits, geographic occurrence, owner types, trends, acreage statistics, reclamation, financial security, and enforcement.
2023 Mineral Fact Sheets (PDF) - a set of colorful fact sheets on New York's major mined commodities; suitable for classroom use.
Production, Market Value and Economic Impact
New York State natural gas production in 2023 was 8.29 billion cubic feet (bcf), down approximately 12.5% from the previous year. Trenton-Black River Formation's gas production was down slightly from 2022 at 1.5 bcf, accounting for about 18% of 2023's total gas production. Gas production from the Medina decreased by more than 12.7% to 4.26 bcf, accounting for nearly 51% of 2023's gas production. Oil production decreased approximately 5.5% from the previous year to 251,397 barrels (bbls) in 2023.
The oil and gas produced in New York State in 2023 is valued at an estimated $38.6 million. The Division of Mineral Resources (DMN) estimates that approximately $1.16 million was generated in local government taxes, and nearly $4.83 million was generated in royalties for landowners.
Wells
In 2023, New York well operators reported 14,619 wells (all of which were regulated well types). Most of these wells were drilled to explore for and/or produce oil or natural gas. Other regulated well types reported in 2023 total include underground gas storage, solution salt mining, geothermal, brine disposal, monitoring, and stratigraphic. The total number of completed wells increased 1.5% from the previous year, reaching 63.
In 2023, a total of 229 operators reported 2,937 wells with zero production for the entire year. This was in addition to the more than 7,300 orphaned, abandoned, and unplugged wells in the Department of Environmental Conservation's (DEC) records.
At the end of 2023, New York held $18.96 million in financial security instruments to guarantee well plugging and site reclamation.
Regulatory Activity
In 2023, DMN issued 16 drilling permits, and operators plugged 77 wells in accordance with DMN-issued plugging permits. In addition, 40 orphaned wells were plugged by DMN. The total drilled depth of all wells for the year was approximately 29,497 feet (i.e., over 5.5 miles).
No compulsory integration hearings were conducted in 2023.
DMN's Oil and Gas staff traveled 69,534 miles to perform 3,379 inspections in 2023. Staff inspect well sites:
- during permit application review;
- during drilling and plugging work, with emphasis on cementing operations;
- to ensure regulatory requirements are followed and that violations, if any, were remedied;
- during production and prior to ownership transfers to ensure compliance;
- to score abandoned wells for assessment of relative threats to the environment and public safety in support of well-plugging initiatives;
- to ensure that reclamation meets requirements; and
- to investigate complaints.
