LEGISLATIVE DEVELOPMENTS

July 2009

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Bill Introduced to Remove Safe Drinking Water Act Exemption for Natural Gas Wells

Democratic efforts to close the so-called “Halliburton Exemption” to the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) have begun. Named after the giant oil service company that first fractured wells in 1949 to improve oil and gas yields, the exemption was placed into the SDWA definition of “underground injection” by the 2005 Energy Policy Act. In so doing, Congress amended the SDWA definition to include the “subsurface emplacement of fluids by well injection,” but to exclude the injection of natural gas for storage and the injection of fluids or propping agents for hydraulic fracturing for oil, gas or geothermal production. See, § 332 of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, P.L. 109-58, 119 Stat. 694, amending 42 U.S.C. §300h(d). On June 9, 2009, companion bills were introduced in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives to eliminate the exemption.