After failing in the last legislative session early this year, a major update of New Mexico’s Oil and Gas Act is again in the works, this time with a sharp push from Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s office. The Oil and Gas Act is the bedrock law outlining how production of the two fossil fuels is regulated in the state, and it hasn’t seen a major update in decades. If finalized, the new bill would be introduced in the legislative session that begins in January.
“This effort was spurred by a recognition that the Oil and Gas Act is stale,” said Sidney Hill, public information officer with the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department (EMNRD), which is home to the Oil Conservation Division, the state’s main oil and gas enforcement agency. He said the last notable changes to the act happened in the 1980s and ’90s. “The act,” Hill said, “no longer contains all the tools necessary to oversee the current industry and ensure robust environment protection.”
