By Jim Saunders ©2024 The News Service of Florida
TALLAHASSEE — An administrative law judge Monday waded into a legal battle about a plan to drill for oil and gas in part of rural Northwest Florida, with project backers and an environmental group offering dramatically different perspectives.
Timothy Riley, an attorney for Clearwater Land & Minerals Fla., LLC, which wants to drill an exploratory well in Calhoun County, said the environment would be “thoroughly protected” and that commercially viable oil and gas likely will be found.
But Tim Perry, an attorney for the environmental organization Apalachicola Riverkeeper, said the plan poses an “unacceptably high” environmental risk to the nearby Apalachicola River and that oil and gas has never been found in Calhoun County or in immediately surrounding areas.
“A prudent investor would not drill this well,” Perry said.
Apalachicola Riverkeeper is challenging a draft permit that the Florida Department of Environmental Protection approved in April for the Louisiana-based Clearwater Land & Minerals Fla. to drill in an unincorporated part of Calhoun County, which is between Tallahassee and Panama City.
The case was sent to the state Division of Administrative Hearings in June, with Judge Lawrence Stevenson on Monday beginning what is expected to be a multi-day hearing.
While the attorneys for the company and Apalachicola Riverkeeper offered opening statements, reporters and other observers were barred from hearing most of the testimony Monday morning because it involved confidential company information. An attorney for the Department of Environmental Protection declined to make an opening statement.
A key issue in the case is the potential effects of drilling on the Apalachicola River and Apalachicola Bay. The state and federal governments have long taken steps to protect the river and bay. They are part of the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river system, which starts in northern Georgia, crosses into Alabama and ends in Apalachicola Bay on the Gulf Coast.
Apalachicola Riverkeeper contends that the project threatens the river and would be in the river’s floodplain.
“The drilling site is not consistent with the relevant Department (of Environmental Protection) rules and statutes, which require applicants to locate projects to minimize impacts to sensitive areas and environments,” Apalachicola Riverkeeper’s petition for an administrative hearing said. “Instead, the drilling site selected by the applicant (Clearwater Land & Minerals Fla.) is in a sensitive area and environment.”
But the department’s draft permit pointed to safeguards planned for the project.
“The permit application includes well control procedures, preventative measures and contingency plans for responding to potential accidents and spills,” the draft permit said. “Best management practices will be employed to reuse or dispose of drilling fluids, cuttings and formation water. Test fluids and gas will be recovered, sold, flared or hauled to permitted out-of-state facilities.”
Stevenson asked attorneys Monday about attempts to settle the dispute. Riley said settlement discussions were unsuccessful.
While relatively unusual for Florida, companies have long drilled for oil around the Santa Rosa County community of Jay and in parts of Southwest Florida. Also, Riley said the planned project in Calhoun County is at a site that was previously permitted for drilling but was never drilled.
One Response to “A judge weighs a plan to drill for oil in north Florida”
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Drilling for oil in Florida is a bad idea for many reasons. We only have one environment and we should not further degrade it. Instead, we should all be moving away from fossil fuel consumption, not creating more. And given the Florida low elevation, drilling for oil will increase the likelihood of environmental damage from an oil spill. Thank you for your reporting on this.