SOUTH CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The South Charleston City Council approved a right-of-way ordinance last week allowing Reserve Oil and Gas Inc. to extend a gas line to a proposed well near Thomas Memorial Hospital.
The company has a well permitted behind the hospital near the railroad tracks along Pennsylvania Avenue. The resolution allows for the line to be extended to the well near houses on Kenna Drive.
Reserve Oil and Gas Land Manager and Counsel Doug Douglass said most of the gas is sold to Mountaineer Gas Corp.
“Our closest location to tie that line is back by Kenna homes and (the West Virginia) State Police (dispatch,)” he said. “It’ll feed the gas from the well to the buyer.”
Douglass said the line also has its economic benefits, adding natural gas production has a potential market in West Virginia.
“I think it’s our potential saving grace for our economic return to our state,” he said. “We have this wonderful resource under our feet that we need to develop and we’ve got to have certain things in place to get a good return on it.”
South Charleston currently has two operating wells on city-owned property: near the house of Kenna Drive and on Little Creek golf course.
Mayor Frank Mullens said the wells have economic potential, but not just for the reasons some may think.
“During the polar vortexes and colder winters, at Corridor G some of the businesses were on the verge of shutting down because there was not enough gas supply to keep the businesses warm,” he said.
Mullens said the company is looking to develop infrastructure to efficiently carry gas down Corridor G.
There is not a schedule for when the well near Thomas Memorial Hospital will become operational.