A recap from our recent webinar with David Stewart, President and Co-Founder, Environmental Services
Last week, Sendero President and Co-Founder of Environmental Services, David Stewart, hosted a webinar to walk through a critical challenge facing the energy industry and a promising market-driven solution. With fresh insights from the field in the Bakken and a trip to Midland on the horizon, David outlined the growing potential of voluntary carbon markets to help plug orphan and marginal wells, protect communities, and reduce methane emissions at scale.
Here’s a recap of what he shared:
The Scale of the Problem
Across the U.S., there are an estimated 310,000 to over 800,000 undocumented orphan wells. Some experts believe the real number could exceed 3 million. Plugging these wells can cost anywhere from $10,000 to over $100,000 each, depending on depth and condition. The total liability far outpaces available public funds. While federal and state programs have made efforts, the gap remains wide.
In addition to existing orphan wells, marginal wells represent a growing risk. When oil prices drop, smaller operators often lack the financial stability to manage these assets long-term. The result? More abandoned wells, more emissions, and growing risk to communities and ecosystems.
Why Carbon Markets Offer a Path Forward
David made the case that voluntary carbon markets offer one of the fastest, most scalable solutions to this problem. By generating legitimate, high-integrity carbon credits from well-plugging activities, operators can unlock capital to address sites that would otherwise remain unplugged.
Sendero’s approach relies on direct measurement, blockchain-based data transparency, and rigorous third-party validation to ensure every ton of avoided methane is real, additional, and verifiable.
“Nobody is going to plug these wells if we don’t,” David said. “And the voluntary markets could provide a level of funding that proves the additionality.”
Meeting Core Carbon Principles with Real Data
David walked through how Sendero’s work aligns with the ICVCM Core Carbon Principles, including:
- Effective governance: Every project includes detailed insurance requirements and long-term monitoring plans.
- Robust quantification: Methane emissions are measured using high-flow samplers, tunable diode lasers, and other EPA-based reference methods.
- Transparency: Data is uploaded to the cloud and recorded via blockchain, providing buyers with second-by-second records of pre- and post-plugging emissions.
- Permanence: Sendero uses cast-iron bridge plugs and cement chemistry matched to formation geology to ensure long-term well integrity.
- No double-counting: Mineral rights law, third-party verification, buffer pools, and insurance overlays all help ensure these credits are unique, legally protected, and not issued more than once.
Bundling for Greater Impact
One of the key insights from the webinar: bundling credits from multiple wells can create outsized environmental and financial benefits.
If one high-emitting well generates enough carbon credit value, those funds can be used to plug nearby lower-emitting wells that wouldn’t otherwise qualify. This approach amplifies the impact by reducing surface risks, protecting aquifers, and helping landowners restore their property.
What’s Next: Getting Buyers Involved
Sendero isn’t developing these projects in a vacuum. David called on buyers to engage early and help shape the standards governing this new class of credits.
Multiple methodologies are emerging right now, from CarbonPath to OneShot Earth to ClimateWells. But the market needs more clarity.
“The buyers have to define the standards,” David emphasized. “We’re all guessing right now. We need to know what’s important to them.”
He also pointed out that early adopters could benefit from lower-cost credits, especially compared to expensive nature-based offsets that are often harder to measure and verify.
Sendero’s Role
With deep environmental expertise and a strong foundation in oilfield operations, the team offers:
- Plugging and abandonment services with live rig monitoring
- Methane quantification and carbon advisory for oil and gas companies
- Environmental compliance and emissions reduction support across the U.S.
From selecting cement types to applying EPA-grade QA/QC, Sendero is building carbon credit projects that can withstand the highest level of scrutiny.
Final Takeaways
- Voluntary carbon markets could unlock new funding to plug orphan and marginal wells faster than any public program.
- High-integrity credits backed by direct measurement, blockchain transparency, and robust engineering design offer real confidence to buyers.
- Input from credit buyers is critical to shaping the methodologies, standards, and monitoring expectations that will define this space.
“We hope this market flourishes in the near future,” David concluded. “We’re working hard to get it right.”
Want to learn more or partner with Sendero? Contact David Stewart.