SB 899 West Virginia Senate · 2025 Regular Session

Protecting coal and gas minerals from carbon capture practices

SB 899 (West Virginia Senate Bill 899) requires carbon storage operators to protect coal and gas mineral rights when seeking permits for carbon capture projects. The bill mandates that permit applicants must verify if valuable minerals exist in the storage area and obtain written agreements with mineral owners to ensure projects won’t harm their interests. Operators must design storage to isolate mineral production from CO2 plumes and secure consent from at least 75% of mineral owners before permits can be issued. This directly affects coal/gas mineral owners, carbon storage companies, and the state’s regulatory secretary, adding specific consent and design requirements to carbon storage permits under West Virginia law.

Issues: ✗ Energy ✗ Environment

Bill status passed 3 of 5 stages cleared

Introduction

Mar 2025

Committee Review

Mar 2025

Senate Passage

Mar 2025

House of Delegates Passage

Governor

Introduced Mar 24, 2025 Last action Mar 26, 2025

Maddy AI version diff · 1 comparison

What changed between versions

Introduced Version → Committee Substitute · 8 edits

MODERATE

The bill was rewritten from an introduced version to a committee substitute version, with significant formatting changes and some substantive text modifications. The most notable substantive change is the expansion of the bill's purpose statement to include 'oil and gas minerals' alongside 'coal minerals' in the protection clause. Several sections were reorganized and renumbered, with some language being clarified or slightly altered for consistency.

Scope change

The bill's scope was slightly expanded to explicitly include oil and gas minerals in the protection provisions, whereas the original only mentioned coal and gas minerals.

SCOPE

The bill's purpose statement was modified to protect both coal and oil and gas minerals from carbon capture practices, expanding the original scope which only mentioned coal and gas minerals.

REQUIREMENT

The permit application requirements were reorganized and renumbered, with some language clarified for better readability and consistency throughout the document.

The language regarding mineral owner protections was slightly reworded to clarify that storage operators must design projects to isolate production from carbon dioxide plumes.

The notice requirements for mineral owners were clarified to specify that notices must be in writing and include specific project information.

The objection process for mineral owners was clarified to require that storage operators address objections to the department's satisfaction before proceeding.

The consent requirements for pore space owners were slightly reworded for clarity, maintaining the 75 percent consent threshold.

The monitoring requirements were slightly reworded to improve clarity while maintaining the same substantive requirements.

The compensation requirements for nonconsenting pore space owners were slightly reworded for clarity.

Floor votes · Senate Mar 26, 2025

How they voted

33–0

Passed

Total votes 33

Mar 26, 2025

D Democratic2

2 Yea

100% Yea

R Republican31

31 Yea

100% Yea

Vote distribution

All Yea All Nay Mixed No data

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Mar 26, 2025

Committee

To House Energy and Public Works

lower

Mar 26, 2025

Introduced

Introduced in House

lower

Mar 26, 2025

Upper · Passed

Passed Senate (Roll No. 191)

upper

Mar 24, 2025

Upper · Passed

Committee substitute reported

upper

Mar 24, 2025

Introduced

Introduced in Senate

upper

1 primary · 3 co-sponsors