March 17, 2025

Mar 17, 2025

In this edition: I take a first-hand look at some of Brown County’s producing oil wells; EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin’s big flip-flop on climate change, and what else it signals.

A Ride-along With Bill Cleveland, Contract Pumper

As I’ve continued my self-guided crash course in local oil, gas, and pipeline history and infrastructure, as a means of informing myself and my readers about the likely impacts of the planned DeLa Express pipeline, I realized I hadn’t talked to Bill Cleveland in a while. I called him up, and he agreed to talk to me about his job checking oil and gas wells.

I’ve always liked Bill. We’re about the same age, and his wife and my partner are best friends. Bill and I don’t really hang out much, but I enjoy his company whenever we do. Beneath his laid-back personality, you can tell he knows a lot, but doesn’t show it off.

The day we were scheduled to meet, his wife called and asked if I’d like to go for a drive with him to see for myself. I got ready in a hurry, and off we went. By the time we did some catching-up small talk, we were leaving town headed north on Hwy. 279 toward Lake Brownwood. Every minute or two we passed a pump jack or some storage tanks, which I would soon learn are called “tank batteries,” consisting of tanks for oil, for the water that comes up with it, and a separator tank that gets each liquid to its proper place.

Bill has lived in this area his whole life, and in Brown County since he was 8. He first started working in the business when his step-father started an independent oil company in the early 1980’s. When oil prices crashed a few years later, the business was sold, and Bill went to work for the new owner.

“I’ve overseen the pumpers, and fixed whatever----motors on pump jacks, laying pipe, well-pulling.” By now we had turned off 279 and were headed west on FM 2492, past Thrifty, to FM 585, where we turned north.

Visiting the Fry

Bill commented that the wells we were passing were part of the Fry Oil Field. (See the Feb. 17 edition of BGN for more history of the Fry Field) He noted that many of the old wells from the Fry Boom of the 1920’s hadn’t been plugged properly. “Back in the ‘90’s we had some wells in the Ellenburger (geological formation)—that makes a lot of water—and another company was disposing water into the Fry. Water started pumping out of those wells, and the Railroad Commission (Texas Oil and Gas Regulating Agency) had to come out and plug them.”

We arrived at our first tank battery to check, near a ranch house. I got out and opened the gate, then we pulled up and Bill pointed out the oil, water, and separator tanks. Everything looked in good order, so we drove up a ranch road on a steep hill covered with thick brush, to a level spot where a lone pump jack was sitting idle. Bill explained that many of these wells are set on a timer to pump just a few times a day. A slow drive around it, back down the hill, out the gate, and we were on our way again, still headed north, toward Grosvenor.

Then we turned west on a gravel road, toward the Coleman County line. As we passed more scattered wells and tanks, Bill explained “These wells were drilled in the early 1980’s. They started out over 100 barrels a day, now they’re down to about 1 and a half….”

We pulled up to another tank battery on the side of the road, and Bill pointed out the clear tubes—sight gauges—that show the level of the liquids inside the tanks. Everything was neat and clean, so we drove on to another gate. After I opened it, we drove down a rutted dirt road, to another lone, idle pump jack. “This one goes on 4 times a day.” Bill noted that he visually checks for leaks, and looks at the motor and belts for any problems. Seeing none, we drove back out, and headed back toward town.

These days, Bill is out 3-4 days a week, “5 or 6, sometimes,” checking wells in Brown and Coleman Counties. Besides the regular inspection routine, he’s on call for whenever problems arise. “I never know where I’m going actually. In 2010-11, when the flow was good, I had 50 wells a day.”

When I asked him to define what a “pumper” does, he said “that’s the guy who goes and checks the wells.” He elaborated: “I’m kind of a hybrid pumper because I do everything—rebuild the valves off the separators, some plumbing, electrical, hooking tank batteries up.”

“I’m a contract pumper, but I’m also a consultant. When he (the oil lease owner) gets a service rig to pull the wells, I watch to see it gets done right.” When I asked Bill to translate that sentence for a novice like myself, he described the basic structure of an oil well, and how the different components, from the pump at the bottom, to the cement casing, and the tube and rods within the casing, can break and need repair and replacement. Bill’s decades of experience with all aspects of well drilling and maintenance are what make him such a valuable asset to local producers.

Ups and Downs

The familiar motion of the pump jack rises and falls, and so does the price of oil and gas. Likewise, every job has its benefits and downsides.

Bill likes working outdoors, and getting the job done when he can assemble and repair the machinery. Then there is the toll of heavy lifting, bad roads, and difficult landowners. He feels the cold now more than he used to.

Equipment in remote rural locations is easy prey to tampering or worse. “You never know when someone is going to do something dumb.”

When I mention my opposition to the DeLa Express pipeline, Bill says he doesn’t get into the debate on climate change. “I know they ain’t gonna go to wind and solar anytime soon. That’ll be after we’re buried.”

EPA Promises Better Living Through More Pollution

Lee Zeldin is confused.

Or, maybe he’s deliberately trying to confuse all of us.

During his January 16 Senate confirmation hearing to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, a humble and earnest Zeldin stated that “I believe climate change is real.”

https://www.nbcnews.com/now/video/zeldin-says-climate-change-must-be-addressed-at-senate-confirmation-hearing-229479493891

Then last week, in an EPA press release announcing the “biggest deregulatory action in US history,” Zeldin proclaimed that “We are driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion….”

So which is it, Lee? A real problem, or merely a belief system?

In a short video accompanying the list of 31 regulatory rollbacks, a proud and almost gleeful Zeldin fails to even mention the EPA’s mission to protect human health and the environment, but emphasizes the consumer and economic benefits that abandoning that mission will supposedly bring:

https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-launches-biggest-deregulatory-action-us-history

I believe Lee’s glee is premature. Most. if not all of his 31 targeted regulations will be subject to a court hearing, and most of them will likely be upheld as legal, valid, and fulfilling EPA’s mission.

But there are no guarantees. If you support the historic mission of the EPA, safeguarding air and water quality for everyone, consider donating to one of the organizations that will be defending that mission in court. My personal favorite is Earthjustice, “because the Earth needs a good lawyer.”

https://earthjustice.org/

Contradictions Offer Political Cover

Zeldin’s reversal on climate change follows the example set in the White House, where any given position or policy is subject to change without notice. As Erica Green noted March 8 in the New York Times, the president has long been known for lies and exaggeration, but in his second term, “his contradictions have become more brazen, and more pronounced.”

“Tony Schwartz, ghostwriter of Trump’s book, The Art of the Deal, has said the president has one goal. ‘His aim is never accuracy,’ Schwartz wrote in an opinion essay during Trump’s first term. ‘It’s domination.’”

There’s nothing in Zeldin’s resume to indicate he is qualified to run the EPA, or has any background or interest at all in environmental issues.

https://www.congress.gov/member/lee-zeldin/Z000017

But he does have the one qualification that seems to matter most to the president—personal loyalty.

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