Drilling rig required to remove abandoned well in Bonnyville; open house Thursday

The location, available for view on the AER’s Abandoned Well Viewer, of the orphaned well leaking methane between 45th and 46th Avenue in Bonnyville.

Residents can learn more about a major disruption coming this summer in Bonnyville, with the demolition of multiple homes and the droning noise of a drilling rig.

An open house is scheduled Thursday evening from 5:00-8:30PM at the Bonnyville Seniors Centre (Pioneer Hall) for an update on the Orphan Well Association’s decommissioning of a well found in a residential area of town leaking methane.

Last June, methane gas was discovered by utility workers replacing a gas meter in the 4500 block between 45th Avenue and 46th Avenue.

The well was drilled by the now defunct licensee Trican Petro-Chemical Corporation in 1954, and with the company being out of existence for decades, the Orphan Well Association was brought in.

In order to properly remedy the issue, the OWA has purchased the two most affected homes, as well as a duplex unit in the Millenium Estates development, to demolish so they can reach the well.

That will create room for a drilling rig to come into Bonnyville sometime in July or August, and work 24 hours for multiple days, to decommission the well.

The OWA is the lead on the project, but the Alberta Energy Regulator, and the Town of Bonnyville have been involved in receiving the necessary information.

“We all have to think it’s for the safety of our municipality. We just cannot have leaking gas for any of our residents,” said Mayor Elisa Brosseau. 

‘Worst case scenario’

The open house is hoped to have more specific details on the previous and future steps, as it is unusual to see such large equipment needed in an urban setting.

The drilling rig is a massive piece of equipment, requiring some 20 truckloads to help move it to the wellsite. This will require traffic controls and a designated path of entry in town.

When asked in September 2024 if the removal of homes and a drilling rig was possible, Lars DePauw of the Orphan Well Association called it the “worst case scenario.”

The wellbore was located and excavated last summer, and a monitoring and mitigation program was implemented to regularly check gas levels in the vicinity of the wellbore.

Low concentrations of methane are not harmful necessarily, but high concentrations could have adverse effects where it replaces the oxygen in the air and leads to asphyxiation.

Methane is flammable though, leading to increased risks of devastating fires.

The OWA says mitigation systems have been installed in eight homes that safely capture any methane and vent it to atmosphere.

Once the well has been decommissioned, the site needs to be monitored so the methane is no longer in the soil.

The Orphan Well Association acts as a backstop when a company is no longer in business and unable to fix the issue themselves.

Two formal presentations will be made by the OWA during the open house at 5:30PM and again at 7:30PM. In between these presentations, OWA personnel will be available for questions along with representatives from the AER and the Town of Bonnyville, authorities say.