Company to Pitch Plan to Revive Wyoming Gas Wells

CASPER, Wyo. (AP) — A Sheridan coal-bed methane company is about to present to state officials its plans to restart a large number of idle coal-bed methane wells in the Powder River Basin.

High Plains Gas owns some 3,000 nonproducing coal-bed methane wells the company recently acquired from an operator that went bankrupt.

High Plains owes the state $5.7 million in additional bond payments. On Tuesday, the Wyoming Oil and Gas Commission is scheduled to hear the company's plan for making those payments and bringing its wells back into production.

That plan relies on a device called the Gazmo, which promoters say can inexpensively separate coal-bed-methane from groundwater.

The Casper Star-Tribune reports state officials may take control of the idle wells and close them if they don't approve of the company's plan.