United States Documented Orphaned Well Database 2026

The United States Documented Orphaned Well Database (DOWDB) contains 130,121 unplugged oil and gas wells in 28 states. This release of the data is an update to, and supersedes, the initial version (Grove and Merrill, 2022). The definition of an orphaned oil or gas well varies across data sources; the database includes oil or gas wells where the state indicates that the well is an unplugged orphan, or the following criteria are met: 1) no production for 6 to 24 months depending on the state (an average of 12 months), 2) the well is unplugged, 3) there is no responsible party to manage the well for future re-use or for plugging and abandonment, and 4) the location of the well is documented. The database includes location coordinates, American Petroleum Institute (API) number, or other identification number, well type, well status, and additional information for each unplugged orphaned well. In this update, completely new orphaned wells records were obtained from the states. As an additional feature, the authors estimated surface and subsurface rights ownership using maps of land ownership, and have attributed that information to the well records. Ownership information here is not official; it is a product of spatial operations that do not account for location errors or actual lease details. Ownership information at the well level was not provided by the states or Bureau of Land Management. Please confirm well responsibility with the appropriate agency or office. All other data were collected from the respective state agency overseeing oil and gas wells via online data sources or by direct requests. Location format conversion was performed on wells without coordinate locations using tools provided by the Bureau of Land Management and some state agencies. No other data manipulations were performed to the source data aside from reformatting or the addition of explanatory notes.