(a) (1) Notwithstanding § 10231.5 of the Government Code, on or before July 1, 2019, and annually thereafter, the supervisor shall, in compliance with § 9795 of the Government Code, prepare and transmit to the Legislature a comprehensive report on the status of idle and long-term idle wells for the preceding calendar year. The report shall include all of the following:

(A) A list of all idle and long-term idle wells in the state by American Petroleum Institute identification number and indicating the operator, field, and pool.

(B) A list of all wells whose idle or long-term idle status changed in the preceding year by American Petroleum Institute identification number with the disposition and current status of each well.

(C) A list of orphan wells remaining, the estimated costs of abandoning those orphan wells, and a timeline for future orphan well abandonment with a specific schedule of goals. Idle and long-term idle wells that have become orphan wells shall be identified in the list. For the purposes of this report, an orphan well is a well that has no party responsible for it, leaving the state to plug and abandon it.

(D) A list of all operators with plans filed with the supervisor for the management and elimination of all long-term idle wells and the status of those plans.

(E) Any additional relevant information as determined by the supervisor.

(2) The report shall be made publicly available and an electronic version shall be available on the division’s internet website.

(b) For the report due on or before July 1, 2022, and each report thereafter, the division shall do both of the following:

(1) Conduct inspections of production facilities attendant to long-term idle wells to ensure compliance with the requirements of this chapter. Information summarizing violations and pertinent findings in these inspections shall be included in the applicable report required to be prepared and transmitted pursuant to subdivision (a).

(2) Identify idle wells by the American Petroleum Institute identification number that are registered to an operator and that have met the definition of an idle well for three years where neither the required annual fee has been paid or the well is part of a valid idle well management plan on file with the supervisor pursuant to subdivision (a) of Section 3206.

(c) For the report due on or before July 1, 2023, and each report thereafter, the division shall provide a description of activities undertaken by the division’s collections unit established pursuant to Section 3243. This description shall include the number of operators and amounts of idle well fees collected by the collections unit in the preceding year, the criteria, including timelines, used by the collections unit to determine a well or attendant facility is deserted, and the amount of costs recovered from operators or responsible parties for work ordered by the supervisor or undertaken by the division. Information related to the division’s use of liens, including, but not limited to, the number of wells and facilities eligible to be subject to a lien, the number of liens placed by the supervisor, and the number of liens released by the supervisor, shall also be provided.

(d) Information on how to access the plans described in subparagraph (D) of paragraph (1) of subdivision (a) shall be made readily available on the division’s internet website.

(e) The division shall continue to regularly provide updated information describing idle and long-term idle wells on the division’s internet website.

(Amended by Stats. 2022, Ch. 844, Sec. 3. (SB 1295) Effective January 1, 2023.)