ARTICLE 1. Definitions and General Provisions [3000. - 3017.]

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC 1.
in effect

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3002. Section 3002.

“Division,” in reference to the government of this state, means the Geologic Energy Management Division in the Department of Conservation; otherwise “division” means Division 3 (commencing with Section 3000) of the Public Resources Code.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3008. Section 3008.

(a) “Well” means any oil or gas well or well for the discovery of oil or gas; any well on lands producing or reasonably presumed to contain oil or gas; any well drilled for the purpose of injecting fluids or gas for stimulating oil or gas recovery, repressuring or pressure maintenance of oil or gas reservoirs, or disposing of waste fluids from an oil or gas field; any well used to inject or withdraw gas from an underground storage facility; or any well drilled within or adjacent to an oil or gas pool for the purpose of obtaining water to be used in production stimulation or repressuring operations. (b) “Prospect well” or “exploratory well” means any well drilled to extend a field or explore a new, potentially productive reservoir. (c) “Active observation well” means a well being used for the sole purpose of gathering reservoir data, such as pressure or temperature in a reservoir being currently produced or injected by the operator. For a well to be an active observation well, the operator shall demonstrate to the division’s satisfaction that the well fulfills a need for gathering reservoir data, and the operator shall provide the division with a summary report of the type of data collected at least annually or as requested by the division. (d) “Idle well” means any well that for a period of 24 consecutive months has not either produced oil or natural gas, produced water to be used in production stimulation, or been used for enhanced oil recovery, reservoir pressure management, or injection. For the purpose of determining whether a well is an idle well, production or injection is subject to verification by the division. An idle well continues to be an idle well until it has been properly abandoned in accordance with Section 3208 or it has been shown to the division’s satisfaction that, since the well became an idle well, the well has for a continuous six-month period either maintained production of oil or natural gas, maintained production of water used in production stimulation, or been used for enhanced oil recovery, reservoir pressure management, or injection. An idle well does not include an active observation well. (e) “Long-term idle well” means any well that has been an idle well for eight or more years. (f) “Low-production well” means an oil or gas well that produces, on average, fewer than 15 barrels of oil a day during the past 12 consecutive months, or a natural gas well whose maximum daily average gas production does not exceed 60,000 cubic feet of gas, per day, during the past 12 consecutive months. A low-production well does not include a natural gas storage well, a dedicated injection well, an active observation well, an idle well as defined in subdivision (d), or a fully plugged and abandoned well.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3009. Section 3009.

“Operator” means a person who, by virtue of ownership, or under the authority of a lease or any other agreement, has the right to drill, operate, maintain, or control a well or production facility.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3010. Section 3010.

“Production facility” means any equipment attendant to oil and gas production or injection operations including, but not limited to, tanks, flowlines, headers, gathering lines, wellheads, heater treaters, pumps, valves, compressors, injection equipment, and pipelines that are not under the jurisdiction of the State Fire Marshal pursuant to Section 51010 of the Government Code.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3011. Section 3011.

(a) The purposes of this division include protecting public health and safety and environmental quality, including reduction and mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions associated with the development of hydrocarbon and geothermal resources in a manner that meets the energy needs of the state. (b) The supervisor shall coordinate with other state agencies and entities described in subdivision (f) of Section 38501 of the Health and Safety Code in furtherance of the goals of the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (Division 25.5 (commencing with Section 38500) of the Health and Safety Code) and to help support the state’s clean energy goals.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3012. Section 3012.

The provisions of this division apply to any land or well situated within the boundaries of an incorporated city in which the drilling of oil wells is now or may hereafter be prohibited, until all wells therein have been abandoned as provided in this chapter.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3013. Section 3013.

This division shall be liberally construed to meet its purposes, and the director and the supervisor, acting with the approval of the director, shall have all powers, including the authority to adopt rules and regulations, which may be necessary to carry out the purposes of this division.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3015. Section 3015.

For the purpose of implementing Section 503 of the Natural Gas Policy Act of 1978, the supervisor may make the determinations entrusted to state agencies having regulatory jurisdiction with respect to the production of natural gas. Such determinations shall be made pursuant to procedures prescribed in guidelines adopted by the supervisor.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3016. Section 3016.

For purposes of this chapter, abandoned underground personal property, including a well, of an operator shall become the property of the mineral interest owner when the operator loses the right to remove the personal property under common law or under a lease or any other agreement that initially gave the operator the right to drill, operate, maintain, or control the well. In that case, in accordance with paragraph (3) of subdivision (c) of Section 3237, the mineral interest owner shall be held jointly liable for the well if, in the lease or other conveyance, the mineral interest owner retained a right to control the well operations that exceeds the scope of an interest customarily reserved in a lease or other conveyance in the event of default.

Cal. Public Resources Code - PRC § 3017. Section 3017.

(a) It is the intent of the Legislature that the oil and gas industry pay for all necessary costs of plugging and abandonment and site restoration of oil and gas wells. (b) It is the intent of the legislature that, to minimize the risk that the state will be liable for costs of plugging and abandonment, no well be transferred to another owner until and unless a bond has been filed that would cover the full cost of plugging and abandonment and site restoration.
Source: CA Legislative Counsel Bulk DataURL: https://downloads.leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/pubinfo_2025.zipFetched: 6/27/2026

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