The Florida Senate

377.19  Definitions.--Unless the context otherwise requires, the words defined in this section shall have the following meanings when found in ss. 377.06, 377.07, and 377.10-377.40:

(1)  "Division" means the Division of Resource Management of the Department of Environmental Protection.

(2)  "State" means the State of Florida.

(3)  "Person" means any natural person, corporation, association, partnership, receiver, trustee, guardian, executor, administrator, fiduciary, or representative of any kind.

(4)  "Oil" means crude petroleum oil and other hydrocarbons, regardless of gravity, which are produced at the well in liquid form by ordinary production methods, and which are not the result of condensation of gas after it leaves the reservoir.

(5)  "Gas" means all natural gas, including casinghead gas, and all other hydrocarbons not defined as oil in subsection (4).

(6)  "Pool" means an underground reservoir containing or appearing to contain a common accumulation of oil or gas or both. Each zone of a general structure which is completely separated from any other zone on the structure is considered a separate pool as used herein.

(7)  "Field" means the general area which is underlaid, or appears to be underlaid, by at least one pool; and "field" includes the underground reservoir, or reservoirs, containing oil or gas, or both. The words "field" and "pool" mean the same thing when only one underground reservoir is involved; however, "field," unlike "pool," may relate to two or more pools.

(8)  "Owner" means the person who has the right to drill into and to produce from any pool and to appropriate the production either for the person or for the person and another, or others.

(9)  "Producer" means the owner or operator of a well or wells capable of producing oil or gas, or both.

(10)  "Waste," in addition to its ordinary meaning, means "physical waste" as that term is generally understood in the oil and gas industry. "Waste" includes:

(a)  The inefficient, excessive, or improper use or dissipation of reservoir energy; and the locating, spacing, drilling, equipping, operating, or producing of any oil or gas well or wells in a manner which results, or tends to result, in reducing the quantity of oil or gas ultimately to be recovered from any pool in this state.

(b)  The inefficient storing of oil; and the locating, spacing, drilling, equipping, operating, or producing of any oil or gas well or wells in a manner causing, or tending to cause, unnecessary or excessive surface loss or destruction of oil or gas.

(c)  Producing oil or gas in such a manner as to cause unnecessary water channeling or coning.

(d)  The operation of any oil well or wells with an inefficient gas-oil ratio.

(e)  The drowning with water of any stratum or part thereof capable of producing oil or gas.

(f)  Underground waste however caused and whether or not defined.

(g)  The creation of unnecessary fire hazards.

(h)  The escape into the open air, from a well producing both oil and gas, of gas in excess of the amount which is necessary in the efficient drilling or operation of the well.

(i)  The use of gas for the manufacture of carbon black.

(j)  Permitting gas produced from a gas well to escape into the air.

(k)  Abuse of the correlative rights and opportunities of each owner of oil and gas in a common reservoir due to nonuniform, disproportionate, and unratable withdrawals, causing undue drainage between tracts of land.

(11)  "Product" means any commodity made from oil or gas and includes refined crude oil, crude tops, topped crude, processed crude petroleum, residue from crude petroleum, cracking stock, uncracked fuel oil, fuel oil, treated crude oil, residuum, gas oil, casinghead gasoline, natural gas gasoline, naphtha, distillate, condensate, gasoline, waste oil, kerosene, benzine, wash oil, blended gasoline, lubricating oil, blends or mixtures of oil with one or more liquid products or byproducts derived from oil or gas, and blends or mixtures of two or more liquid products or byproducts derived from oil or gas, whether hereinabove enumerated or not.

(12)  "Illegal oil" means oil which has been produced within the state from any well or wells in excess of the amount allowed by rule, regulation, or order of the division, as distinguished from oil produced within the state from a well not producing in excess of the amount so allowed, which is "legal oil."

(13)  "Illegal gas" means gas which has been produced within the state from any well or wells in excess of the amount allowed by any rule, regulation, or order of the division, as distinguished from gas produced within the State of Florida from a well not producing in excess of the amount so allowed, which is "legal gas."

(14)  "Illegal product" means any product of oil or gas, any part of which was processed or derived, in whole or in part, from illegal gas or illegal oil or from any product thereof, as distinguished from "legal product," which is a product processed or derived to no extent from illegal oil or illegal gas.

(15)  "Reasonable market demand" means the amount of oil reasonably needed for current consumption, together with a reasonable amount of oil for storage and working stocks.

(16)  "Tender" means a permit or certificate of clearance for the transportation or the delivery of oil, gas, or products, approved and issued or registered under the authority of the division.

(17)  The use of the word "and" includes the word "or" and the use of "or" includes "and," unless the context clearly requires a different meaning, especially with respect to such expressions as "oil and gas" or "oil or gas."

(18)  "Well site" means the general area around a well, which area has been disturbed from its natural or existing condition, as well as the drilling or production pad, mud and water circulation pits, and other operation areas necessary to drill for or produce oil or gas.

(19)  "Oil and gas administrator" means the State Geologist.

(20)  "Operator" means the entity who has the right to drill and to produce a well.

(21)  "Completion date" means the day, month, and year that a new productive well, a previously shut-in well, or a temporarily abandoned well is completed, repaired, or recompleted and the operator begins producing oil or gas in commercial quantities.

(22)  "Shut-in well" means an oil or gas well that has been taken out of service for economic reasons or mechanical repairs.

(23)  "Temporarily abandoned well" means a permitted well or wellbore that has been abandoned by plugging in a manner that allows reentry and redevelopment in accordance with oil or gas rules of the Department of Environmental Protection.

(24)  "New field well" means an oil or gas well completed after July 1, 1997, in a new field as designated by the Department of Environmental Protection.

(25)  "Horizontal well" means a well completed with the wellbore in a horizontal or nearly horizontal orientation within 10 degrees of horizontal within the producing formation.

History.--s. 14, ch. 22819, 1945; ss. 25, 35, ch. 69-106; s. 138, ch. 71-377; s. 1, ch. 76-104; s. 1, ch. 77-174; s. 67, ch. 79-65; s. 1, ch. 94-193; s. 309, ch. 94-356; s. 1021, ch. 95-148; s. 74, ch. 96-323.