Los Angeles was an oil town

Los Angeles Oil Drills Give Way to Skyline Views

(from Urbanize.LA)

One can also say that LA oil drills gave way to new skyline views as well as the birth of environmental engineering.

Long before becoming the epicenter for the film industry, Los Angeles was an oil town. Though few remnants remain today, a large oil field once cut a broad swath through the heart of Los Angeles, running from just south of present-day Dodger Stadium to Vermont Avenue in what is now Koreatown.  It began large-scale operations in the early 1890s, before peaking at the turn of the 20th century and falling into decline as development encroached into its territory over ensuing decades.

The photo (above) from the USC Digital Archive was taken near the intersection of Edgeware Road and Court Street in the first decade of the 1900s.  It depicts oil production in the Westlake area near the era’s peak.  Note the small home at 1274 Court Street at the terminus of Edgeware.  The after image below, taken in 2018 by Laurie Avocado, shows this same view in a modern context.  Gone are the abundance of oil drills, replaced by the skyscrapers of Downtown Los Angeles.  The lone remnant of the century-old image is that same house at 1274 Court Street.

Successful Oil Well Re-Abandonment Work in Santa Fe Springs

Terra-Petra Oil Well Abandonment The end of August 2016 marked the commencement of Terra-Petra’s re-abandonment of a single oil and gas well located on a client’s property in Santa Fe Springs, California.

Terra-Petra managed all of the oil well permitting matters associated with an unspecified redevelopment of the site since March of this year — consulting with the property owner and negotiating with the Division of Oil Gas and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) on all oil well related compliance matters in an attempt to bring the site up to current standards so that it can be redeveloped.

Terra-Petra provided a full turn-key approach to address the oil well compliance matters upon submitting the Construction Site Plan Review, wrote the well reabandonment program, filed for and received the Permit to Conduct Well Operations and currently in the process of re-abandoning the well. The well re-abandonment work typically consists of drilling out all existing cement plugs within the well all the way to depth.

Oil well re-abandonment

Once the well is cleaned out new “isolation plugs” consisting of cement are installed at varying depths to seal off different oil and gas producing zones including the upper hydrocarbon zone as well as the base of fresh water.

The cementing operations are completed with a final cement plug from 25’-35’ deep to the surface.  A steel plate is tack welded to the exterior steel casing and the last 5 digits of the API number are welded to it.

The well then must be surveyed prior to burying with latitude and longitude in a specific DOGGR approved format. Terra-Petra is anticipating a completion date of September 23, 2016. Please contact Terra-Petra for any of your oil well related needs. 

Terra-Petra Oil Well Abandonment

oil well re-abandonment