Conservation and Indigenous groups are suing New Mexico officials for failing to require oil and gas companies to clean up thousands of unplugged and inactive wells across the state.
The oil and gas wells are endangering the welfare of communities across New Mexico by emitting harmful air pollutants, contaminating fresh water and leaking planet-warming methane emissions, the groups said in a lawsuit filed Monday in the First Judicial District Court in Santa Fe County.
State officials have not been enforcing requirements under the New Mexico Oil and Gas Act to ensure that operators are plugging and remediating unused wells and the surrounding areas as a condition of operating in the state, the groups told the court.
“Defendants have allowed hundreds of operators to leave thousands of wells to sit idle and unplugged, with surrounding sites unremediated for years — or in many cases, decades — in violation of the law,” the groups said in their court filing.
