Sec. 85.046. WASTE. (a) The term "waste," among other things, specifically includes:

(1) operation of any oil well or wells with an inefficient gas-oil ratio and the commission may determine and prescribe by order the permitted gas-oil ratio for the operation of oil wells;

(2) drowning with water a stratum or part of a stratum that is capable of producing oil or gas or both in paying quantities;

(3) underground waste or loss, however caused and whether or not the cause of the underground waste or loss is defined in this section;

(4) permitting any natural gas well to burn wastefully;

(5) creation of unnecessary fire hazards;

(6) physical waste or loss incident to or resulting from drilling, equipping, locating, spacing, or operating a well or wells in a manner that reduces or tends to reduce the total ultimate recovery of oil or gas from any pool;

(7) waste or loss incident to or resulting from the unnecessary, inefficient, excessive, or improper use of the reservoir energy, including the gas energy or water drive, in any well or pool; however, it is not the intent of this section or the provisions of this chapter that were formerly a part of Chapter 26, Acts of the 42nd Legislature, 1st Called Session, 1931, as amended, to require repressuring of an oil pool or to require that the separately owned properties in any pool be unitized under one management, control, or ownership;

(8) surface waste or surface loss, including the temporary or permanent storage of oil or the placing of any product of oil in open pits or earthen storage, and other forms of surface waste or surface loss including unnecessary or excessive surface losses, or destruction without beneficial use, either of oil or gas;

(9) escape of gas into the open air in excess of the amount necessary in the efficient drilling or operation of the well from a well producing both oil and gas;

(10) production of oil in excess of transportation or market facilities or reasonable market demand, and the commission may determine when excess production exists or is imminent and ascertain the reasonable market demand; and

(11) surface or subsurface waste of hydrocarbons, including the physical or economic waste or loss of hydrocarbons in the creation, operation, maintenance, or abandonment of an underground hydrocarbon storage facility.

(b) Notwithstanding the provisions contained in this section or elsewhere in this code or in other statutes or laws, the commission may permit production by commingling oil or gas or oil and gas from multiple stratigraphic or lenticular accumulations of oil or gas or oil and gas where the commission, after notice and opportunity for hearing, has found that producing oil or gas or oil and gas in a commingled state will prevent waste, promote conservation, or protect correlative rights.

(c) The commission, after notice and opportunity for hearing, may permit surface commingling of production of oil or gas or oil and gas from two or more tracts of land producing from the same reservoir or from one or more tracts of land producing from different reservoirs if the commission finds that the commingling will prevent waste, promote conservation, or protect correlative rights. The commission may permit the commingling regardless of whether the tracts or commission-designated reservoirs have the same working or royalty interest ownership. The amount of production attributable to each tract or commission-designated reservoir shall be determined in a manner consistent with this title. The commission has broad discretion in administering this subsection and shall adopt and enforce rules or orders as necessary to administer this subsection.

Acts 1977, 65th Leg., p. 2517, ch. 871, art. I, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1977. Amended by Acts 1979, 66th Leg., p. 673, ch. 300, Sec. 1, eff. May 29, 1979; Acts 1981, 67th Leg., p. 3166, ch. 830, Sec. 2, eff. June 17, 1981; Acts 1995, 74th Leg., ch. 870, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1995; Acts 1995, 74th Leg., ch. 871, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1995.