Proposal to drill and produce three wells from two surface locations outside of the Lower Neches River Corridor Unit and Beaumont Unit and install a flowline beneath the Lower Neches River Corridor Unit in Hardin, Jasper, and Orange counties, Texas

The National Park Service (NPS) is reviewing a proposal by Century Exploration Houston, LLC (Century) to directionally drill and produce privately held minerals at two surface locations outside of Big Thicket National Preserve (Preserve), each having bottomhole targets beneath the Preserve. Century also proposes to install a flowline via horizontal directional drill beneath the Lower Neches River Corridor Unit in Hardin and Jasper counties, Texas to transport the extracted minerals. The DC Montgomery #1 well would be directionally drilled from an existing well pad located approximately 1,406 feet west (at the nearest point) of the Lower Neches River Corridor Unit in Hardin County, Texas, with the bottomhole location being approximately 8,800 feet beneath the unit. The Phineas #3 and Wile E. Coyote wells would be directionally drilled from an existing well pad located approximately 1,301 feet east of the Beaumont Unit in Orange County, Texas, with both bottomholes approximately 11,100 feet below the unit.
The proposed operation falls under two separate regulations found at 36 CFR 9B. Century must submit a Plan of Operations to the NPS for the installation of the flowline. Century must submit an application for exemption under NPS regulation 36 CFR 9.32e for the proposal to directionally drill and produce privately held minerals at two surface locations outside the Preserve. An exemption may be issued if the NPS determines that the operations pose "no significant threat of damage to park resources…" The scope of the 9.32e analysis is limited to the scope of the regulations which include only those activities occurring within the Preserve boundary.

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