American Oil and Gas Reporter - June 2018 - 35

under the radar until very late in the session, and then legislators wanted to exempt
their districts, saying it was not a good
use of customers' money."
As finally approved, the bill exempted
only Davidson, Hamilton, Knox and Shelby
counties, which contain Tennessee's four
largest cities. "In the end, it became a
moot point when it was pointed out that
several counties did not even have municipal
natural gas utilities," Reiley suggests.
Ultimately, she considers, the experience reinforces TOGA's strategy of encouraging legislators to move its favored
bills early in a session. "By the end of
the session, there are plenty of reasons
for legislators to be mad at each other,"
Reiley muses. "Maybe there was a vote
or a comment at a hearing. Near the end
of the session, the animosity comes out.
It's like going to your hometown on vacation: After a few days, you remember
why you left in the first place."
Other Issues
Laine expresses approval that the
legislature finally has approved legislation to return to the state primacy in
regulating the state's surface coal mining.
"We brought back primacy in regulating
Class II injection wells in 2015," Laine
notes. "This was just as important for
our coal industry."
According to Laine, the general assembly passed legislation to establish
and fund a new state agency to regulate
and enforce surface coal mining regulations. Moving the regulatory activity from
the federal government under the Surface
Mining Control and Reclamation Act to
the state, industry can expect a more
transparent process and the federal government will be relieved of a $3 million
budget item, Laine observes.
"Tennessee was one of the last states
not to have primacy over surface coal mining," Laine notes. "It was putting development of our resources at a disadvantage."
According to Laine, the bill also may
have helped to turn fossil fuel opponents'
attention away from oil and gas. "This
was the quietest session I can remember,"
he describes. "The mining bill meant the
environmentalists were only looking in
that direction. Next January, we start all
over again."
Meanwhile, he adds, Tennessee's oil
and gas companies continue to show progressively more signs of life. "Permitting
for new wells has picked up this year
and for the first time in a while, we are
seeing permits in areas outside of conventional areas," Laine reports. "There is
a lot more optimism these days and deals
are being made."
r

Legislation Harmful To Industry
Gains Little Traction In Kansas
MCPHERSON, KS.-In a 2018 Kansas
Legislature dominated by public school
finance, Sunflower State oil and gas producers largely kept anti-industry attacks
at bay, indicates Kansas Independent Oil
& Gas Association President Edward Cross.
Such attacks were plentiful, he noted
during KIOGA's 2018 midyear meeting,
but they also never gained momentum.
According to Cross, the bills KIOGA
opposed during the session that never
cleared their committees of origin included:
* HB 2641 by Representative Ponka-We Victors, D-Wichita, which sought
to restrict injection well volumes and impose additional reporting requirements;
* HB 2669 by Victors and Representative Nancy Lusk, D-Overland Park,
which sought to require injection well
operators to obtain liability insurance for
induced seismicity damages;
* HB 2672, which would have prohibited injection within 10 miles of faults,
imposed extensive groundwater testing
requirements, and required operators to
pay a $1,000 permit fee for injection
wells, as well as pay into a fund for a citizens' injection board; and
* HB 2786 from Representative Eileen
Horn, D-Lawrence, which sought to create
a task force to study injection wells that
would have included significant numbers
of participants who lacked standing on
the issue.

Meanwhile, Cross reported, anti-development activists' frequent use of voter
initiatives in other producing states prompted KIOGA to oppose an ultimately unsuccessful resolution to amend the Kansas
Constitution to expand voters' initiative
and referendum powers.
KIOGA was more receptive to another
Horne proposal, HB 2727, which related
to notification and disclosure of mineral
interests in real estate contracts, Cross
said. However, even though the association
remained neutral on the legislation and it
cleared the House Water & Environment
Committee, the fact that the bill never
came to the chamber floor prevented KIOGA from having to monitor any possible
anti-industry amendments, he related.
According to Cross, the 2018 session
included a Kansas Corporation Commission
report to lawmakers about the relationship
of surface rights to oil and gas production
that confirmed a position KIOGA had taken
during years in which the group opposed
surface rights legislation advocated by
groups including the Sierra Club. According
to Cross, the KCC found that the issues the
surface rights legislation purported to address
"were exceptions and not the normal course
of business in the Kansas oil and gas
industry. Nothing indicated the need for
further regulatory/statutory requirements."
r
See Story, page 117

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JUNE 2018 35
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American Oil and Gas Reporter - June 2018

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