TITLE 12 CONSERVATION AND NATURAL RESOURCES

Section 4. Mineral Resources and Caves, 12-4-1 through 12-4-147.

ARTICLE 2 MINING AND DRILLING

12-4-42. Definitions.

As used in this part, the term:

1. "Board" means the Board of Natural Resources.

   (1.1) "Director" means the director of the Environmental Protection Division of the Department of Natural Resources.

2. "Drilling" means the boring of a hole in the earth by remote mechanical means and all associated activities, including but not limited to casing, perforating, plugging, cementing, and capping.
3. "Environmentally sensitive area of the coastal zone" means that area of the coastal zone where salt-water-bearing strata overlie the fresh-water aquifer system.
4. "Field" means the general area which is underlaid or appears to be underlaid by at least one pool. This term shall include the underground reservoir or reservoirs containing crude petroleum oil or natural gas, or both. The words "field" and "pool" mean the same thing when only one underground reservoir is involved; however, "field," unlike "pool," may relate to two or more pools.
5. "Gas" means all natural gas, including casing-head gas, and all other hydrocarbons not defined as oil in paragraph (10) of this Code section.

   (5.1) "Hydraulic fracturing" means those operations conducted in an individual well bore designed to increase the flow of hydrocarbons from the rock formation to such well bore through modification of the permeability of reservoir rock by fracturing it through application of fluids under pressure.

6. "Illegal mineral" means any mineral, including oil or gas, which has been produced within the State of Georgia in violation of this part, any rule or regulation adopted and promulgated pursuant to this part, or any order issued under this part.
7. "Illegal product" means any product of oil, gas, or other mineral, any part of which was processed or derived, in whole or in part, from an illegal mineral.
8. "Mineral" means any naturally occurring substance found in the earth which has commercial value. This term shall include oil and gas, as defined in this Code section, but shall not include fresh water.
9. "Mineral product" means any commodity made from any mineral.
10. "Oil" means crude petroleum oil and other hydrocarbons, regardless of gravity, which are produced at the well in liquid form by ordinary production methods and which are not the result of condensation of gas after it leaves the reservoir.
11. "Owner" means the person who has the right to drill into and produce from any pool and to appropriate the production either for himself or herself and another, or himself or herself and others.
12. "Person" means any natural person, corporation, joint venture, association, partnership, receiver, trustee, guardian, executor, administrator, fiduciary or representative of any kind, all agencies or instrumentalities of the state, and all county or municipal governments or any authority.
13. "Pool" means an underground reservoir containing a common accumulation of crude petroleum oil or natural gas, or both. Each zone of a general structure which is completely separated from any other zone in the structure is covered by the term "pool" as used in this part.
14. "Producer" means the owner of a well or wells capable of producing oil or gas, or both.
15. "Tender" means a permit or certificate of clearance for the transportation of minerals, including oil and gas, or mineral products produced under this part, approved and issued or registered under the authority of the board.
16. "Unitization agreement" means a voluntary agreement between operators to create operation units.
17. "Waste," in addition to its ordinary meaning, means "physical waste" as that term is generally understood in the oil and gas industry. The term shall also include, but not be limited to:
    1. The inefficient, excessive, or improper use or dissipation of reservoir energy and the locating, spacing, drilling, equipping, operating, or producing of any oil or gas well or wells in a manner which results, or tends to result, in a reduction in the quantity of oil or gas ultimately to be recovered from any pool in this state;
    2. The inefficient storing of oil and the locating, spacing, drilling, equipping, operating, or producing of any oil or gas well or wells in a manner causing, or tending to cause, unnecessary or excessive surface loss or destruction of oil or gas;
    3. Abuse of the correlative rights and opportunities of each owner of gas or oil in a common reservoir due to nonuniform, disproportionate, and unratable withdrawals causing undue drainage between tracts of lands;
    4. The production of oil or gas in such a manner as to cause unnecessary water channeling or zoning;
    5. The operation of any oil well or wells with an inefficient gas-oil ratio;
    6. The drowning with water of any stratum or part thereof capable of producing gas or oil, except where approval for such a project has been granted by the department;
    7. Underground waste, however caused and whether or not defined, as the same relates to any activity regulated by this part;
    8. The creation of unnecessary fire hazards as the same relates to any activity regulated by this part;
    9. The escape into the open air, from a well producing both oil and gas, of gas in excess of the amount which is necessary in the efficient drilling or operation of the well; and
    10. Permitting gas produced from a gas well to escape into the air, except for testing purposes.
18. "Well" means any boring drilled in the search for or the production of oil, gas, or other minerals or water.

(Ga. L. 1945, p. 366, § 8; Ga. L. 1975, p. 966, § 3; Ga. L. 1976, p. 544, §§ 1-3; Ga. L. 1984, p. 398, § 1; Ga. L. 2018, p. 953, § 1/HB 205.)

The 2018 amendment, effective May 8, 2018, added paragraph (5.1); inserted "or herself" twice in paragraph (11); and added "and" at the end of subparagraph (17)(I).