§1104. Duties and powers of the secretary; rules and regulations; permits
A. The department's actions under this Chapter shall be directed and controlled by
the secretary. The secretary shall have authority to:
(1) Regulate the development and operation of storage facilities and pipelines
transporting carbon dioxide to storage facilities, including unitization in accordance with the
provisions of R.S. 30:1104.2 and the issuance of certificates of public convenience and
necessity for storage facilities and pipelines in accordance with the provisions of R.S.
30:1107.
(2) Make, after notice and hearings as provided in this Chapter, any reasonable rules,
regulations, and orders that are necessary from time to time in the proper administration and
enforcement of this Chapter, including rules, regulations, or orders for the following
purposes:
(a) To require the drilling, casing, and plugging of wells to be done in such a manner
as to prevent the escape of carbon dioxide out of one stratum to another.
(b) To prevent the intrusion of carbon dioxide into oil, gas, salt formation, or other
commercial mineral strata.
(c) To prevent the pollution of fresh water supplies by oil, gas, salt water, or carbon
dioxide.
(d) To require the plugging of each abandoned well and the closure of associated
surface facilities, the removal of equipment, structures, and trash, and to otherwise require
a general site cleanup of such abandoned wells.
(3) Make such inquiries as he deems proper to determine whether or not waste, over
which he has jurisdiction, exists or is imminent. In the exercise of this power the secretary
has the authority to collect data; to make investigations and inspections; to examine
properties, papers, books, and records; to examine, survey, check, test, and gauge injection,
withdrawal and other wells used in connection with carbon storage; to examine, survey,
check, test, and gauge tanks, and modes of transportation; to hold hearings; to provide for
the keeping of records and the making of reports; to require the submission of an emergency
phone number by which the operator may be contacted in case of an emergency; and to take
any action as reasonably appears to him to be necessary to enforce this Chapter.
(4) Require the making of reports showing the location of all wells used in
connection with a storage facility, and the filing of logs, electrical surveys, and other drilling
records.
(5) Prevent wells from being drilled and operated in a manner which may cause
injury to neighboring leases or property.
(6) Prevent blowouts, caving, and seepage in the sense that conditions indicated by
these terms are generally understood in the storage business.
(7) Identify the ownership of all wells used in connection with a storage facility,
tanks, plants, structures, and all other storage and transportation equipment and facilities.
(8) Nothing in this Chapter shall prevent an enhanced oil and gas recovery project
utilizing injection of carbon dioxide as approved under R.S. 30:4.
(9) Approve conversion to geologic storage facilities of hydrocarbon-bearing
formations, including depleted oil formations as well as existing or pre-existing enhanced
oil or gas recovery operations, if necessary, taking into consideration prior approvals of the
secretary regarding such enhanced oil recovery operations.
(10) Promulgate rules and regulations requiring storage operators to place monitoring
equipment of a type approved by the secretary on all storage facilities, and ancillary
equipment necessary and proper to monitor, verify carbon dioxide injections, and to prevent
waste. It shall be a violation of this Chapter for any operator to refuse to attach or install a
monitor within a reasonable period of time when ordered to do so by the secretary, or in any
way to tamper with the monitors so as to produce a false or inaccurate reading.
(11) Regulate by rules, the drilling, casing, cementing, injection interval, monitoring,
plugging and permitting of injection, withdrawal and other wells which are used in
connection with a storage facility and to regulate all surface facilities incidental to such
storage operation.
(12) Require the plugging of each abandoned well or each well which is of no further
use and the closure of associated surface facilities, the removal of equipment, structures, and
trash, and other general site cleanup of such abandoned or unused well sites.
(13) Promulgate rules related to the setting and collection of fees and civil penalties
pursuant to this Chapter.
B. Unless that person is also the owner or operator of the facility or activity regulated
under the provisions of this Chapter, the owner, shipper, or generator of carbon dioxide shall
not be deemed responsible for the performance of any actions required by the secretary under
this Chapter.
C. Prior to the use of any reservoir for the storage of carbon dioxide and prior to the
exercise of eminent domain pursuant to the provisions of R.S. 19:2(11) and R.S. 30:1108 by
any person, firm, or corporation having such right under laws of the state of Louisiana, and
as a condition precedent to such use or to the exercise of such rights of eminent domain
pursuant to the provisions of R.S. 19:2(11) and R.S. 30:1108, the secretary, after public
hearing pursuant to the provisions of R.S. 30:6, held in the parish where the storage facility
is to be located, shall have found at least one of the following:
(1) That the reservoir sought to be used for the injection, storage, and withdrawal of
carbon dioxide is suitable and feasible for such use, provided no reservoir, any part of which
is producing or is capable of producing oil, gas, condensate, or other commercial mineral in
paying quantities, shall be subject to such use, unless any of the following applies:
(a) The reservoir or any part thereof sought to be used for storage under this Chapter
is producing or is capable of producing oil, gas, condensate, or other commercial mineral in
paying quantities, and all owners in such reservoir or relevant part thereof have agreed to
such use.
(b) The volumes of original reservoir, oil, gas, condensate, salt, or other commercial
mineral therein which are capable of being produced in paying quantities have all been
produced.
(c) Such reservoir has a greater value or utility as a reservoir for carbon dioxide
storage than for the production of the remaining volumes of original reservoir oil, gas,
condensate, or other commercial mineral, and at least three-fourths of the owners, in interest,
exclusive of any "lessor" defined in R.S. 30:148.1, have consented to such use in writing.
(2) That the use of the reservoir for the storage of carbon dioxide will not
contaminate other formations containing fresh water, oil, gas, or other commercial mineral
deposits.
(3) That the proposed storage will not endanger human lives or cause a hazardous
condition to property.
D. The secretary shall determine with respect to any such reservoir proposed to be
used as a storage reservoir, whether or not such reservoir is fully depleted of the original
commercially recoverable natural gas, condensate, or other commercial mineral therein. If
the secretary finds that such reservoir has not been fully depleted, the secretary shall
determine the amount of the remaining commercially recoverable natural gas, condensate,
or other commercial mineral of such reservoir.
E. The secretary may issue any necessary order providing that all carbon dioxide
which has previously been reduced to possession and which is subsequently injected into a
storage reservoir shall at all times be deemed the property of the party that owns such carbon
dioxide, whether at the time of injection or pursuant to a change of ownership by agreement
while the carbon dioxide is located in the storage facility, his successors and assigns; and in
no event shall such carbon dioxide be subject to the right of the owner of the surface of the
lands or of any mineral interest therein under which such storage reservoir shall lie or be
adjacent to or of any person other than the owner, his successors, and assigns to produce,
take, reduce to possession, waste, or otherwise interfere with or exercise any control there
over, provided that the owner, his successors, and assigns shall have no right to gas, liquid
hydrocarbons, salt, or other commercially recoverable minerals in any stratum or portion
thereof not determined by the secretary to constitute an approved storage reservoir. The
secretary shall issue such orders, rules, and regulations as may be necessary for the purpose
of protecting any such storage reservoir, strata, or formations against pollution or against the
escape of carbon dioxide therefrom, including such necessary rules and regulations as may
pertain to the drilling into or through such storage reservoir.
F. Repealed by Acts 2025, No. 458, §11, eff. Oct. 1, 2025.