Court Opinion

ID: 9547464
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:47:43.896033+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:17:46.882220
License: Public Domain

ROONEY, Justice,
dissenting, with whom BROWN, Justice, joins.
I believe the majority opinion reaches beyond the stars in its effort to find existence of authority in the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission to decide where access roads shall be constructed over privately or publicly owned lands under the guise of environmental control.
Because the word “conservation” is in the name of the Commission, the majority opinion now gives the job of protecting the environment to the Commission. Quite a reach! First, the Commission’s job is to “conserve” oil and gas and protect correlative rights — nothing else. And second, another agency is charged with environmental protection.
The area of interest on the part of the Commission is defined in § 30-5-101 et seq., W.S.1977. The entire thrust of the act is to prohibit “[t]he waste of oil and gas or either of them * * * as in this act defined” § 30-5-102(a), W.S.1977. Waste is defined in § 30-5-101(a) as pertaining only to oil and gas without any reference to the environment. It speaks of “[pjhysical waste, as that term is generally understood in the oil and gas industry,” proper spacing of wells, flaring of gas, production in excess of transportation or storage facilities, prudent and proper operations, drilling to avoid or reduce the recoverable oil and gas, inefficient storing of oil and gas and dissipation of reservoir energy, etc. — all directed at eliminating waste, or at conservation of oil and gas. Inexco Oil Company v. Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, Wyo., 490 P.2d 1065 (1971). Nothing is said with reference to an environmental impact or effect occasioned by access roads — or even of the environmental effect of the oil or gas field itself.
The powers and duties given to the Commission are likewise directed to the same end. In § 30-5-104, W.S.1977, its jurisdiction and authority is that “necessary to effectuate the purposes and intent of this act.” Can anyone take an impartial look at the act and not conclude its purpose and intent is only to prohibit waste of oil and gas, and to protect correlative rights in oil and gas, or stated the other way — to conserve oil and gas? There is nothing in the act directed at general environmental protection.
Correlative rights of those having an interest in oil and gas are protected by the Commission as an adjunct to the prevention of waste. Section 30-5-104 requires identification of ownership of wells, leases, tanks, etc., the filing of logs which are to be kept confidential for six months, and the establishment and regulation of units and pooling. The protection of correlative rights has nothing to do with the environment.
The only reference in the act having any concern with the environment is § 30-5-104(d)(ii), quoted in fn. 4 of the majority opinion, and that concern is with disposal of oil field wastes and “contamination or waste of underground water” resulting from oil field activities. The entire subsection (ii) is directed to oil field activities relating to waste of oil and gas, to correlative rights of those interested in the oil and gas, and to water contamination and waste. It makes no reference to access roads or environmental “eye sores.” If Rule 326 (Chapter III, Section 26) of the Rules and Regulations of the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission1 goes beyond the statute’s perimeters, it goes beyond *242that authorized by law and amounts to an impermissible extension of the Commission’s jurisdiction. There is no statutory authority for the provision in Rule 326 beyond that having to do with pollution of water, unless it is read to prohibit damage to land by oil waste being permitted to run onto the lands.
And this brings us to the second basis for reversing this case. The job of protecting the environment has been legislatively given to another agency. The Wyoming Environmental Quality Act (§ 35-11-101 et seq., W.S.1977) creates an agency to administer its provisions. The Act was designed to dovetail with the federal legislation on the subject. The legislature carefully defined that in which the created agency could act in control of the environment. If the incident here complained of was not included in that act, such was the legislative decision. Certainly, it is not intended that the Oil and Gas Conservation Commission should come in the back door and make environmental decisions entrusted to the agency set up to do so.
In Rocky Mountain Oil and Gas Association v. State, Wyo., 645 P.2d 1163 (1982), we noted an issue that was not before us relative to which agency, the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission or the Environmental Quality Council, had authorization to control water discharge in connection with oil well activity. The issue in the case involved the availability of a declaratory judgment. We did quote the extensive definition of pollution set out in the Wyoming Environmental Quality Act (§ 35-ll-103(a)(i), W.S.1977) and emphasized the language which provides that:
“ ‘ * * * This term does not mean water, gas or other material which is injected into a well to facilitate production of oil, or gas or water, derived in association with oil or gas production and disposed of in a well ⅜ * (Emphasis in original.) 645 P.2d at 1165.
The importance of the discussion in Rocky Mountain Oil and Gas Association v. State, supra, as it pertains to this case, is the recognition that the Environmental Quality Council is recognized as having control over pollution of waters and of general environmental problems rather than the Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, perhaps with the exception of water pollution resulting from oil well activity.
I do not believe that we need to address the federal preemption issue. The Oil and Gas Conservation Commission had no jurisdiction over the question of whether or not an access road was improper on the basis of environmental injury.
I would return the case to the Commission with directions to issue or deny the requested permits without consideration of environmental questions beyond water pollution from well activity. The environmental and other access problems should be addressed in another forum and in another manner.

. Rule 326 provides in part:
"The owner shall not pollute streams, underground water, or unreasonably damage the surface of the leased premises or other lands.”