UNSPSC 71121600: Oil well drilling services

Includes rental of drilling tools, over and under balanced services, platform drilling, directional drilling.

UNSPSC 71121600 Oil well drilling services is a Class code that encompasses plugging, abandonment, and site restoration of orphaned oil and gas wells, as well as emergency response drilling and remediation operations across state and federal lands. State and local governments soliciting under this code include state environmental and natural resources agencies, state oil and gas boards, and county authorities managing orphaned well remediation programs. The Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy, the Mississippi Oil and Gas Board, the Texas General Land Office, and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources are the primary state-level issuers posting direct solicitations and invitation-for-bid notices for orphaned well services over the past two months. Work being solicited includes comprehensive well plugging operations with site abandonment and restoration; plugging services are frequently bundled with environmental remediation, waste removal, equipment decontamination, and site reclamation into turnkey contracts. Representative recent opportunities include the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy soliciting plugging and site restoration services for four separate groups of orphaned gas storage wells in Gratiot and Montcalm Counties (38 wells total) under direct solicitations DS 260000000032–34 through July 21, 2026, with prequalification through five prior RFPs and mandatory pre-bid meetings required; the Mississippi Oil and Gas Board issuing invitation-for-bids for plugging, remediation, and reclamation of multiple orphaned wells across Mississippi counties with bids due April 13–28, 2026; and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources procuring supplemental irrigation well installation and pump systems for state fish and wildlife areas under small business set-asides with bids due in mid-March 2026.

Activity is concentrated in Michigan, Mississippi, Texas, and Illinois, with additional solicitations posted by Florida, California, and Oregon jurisdictions for water well construction, maintenance, and rehabilitation services that fall tangentially within drilling-service categories. Recent Michigan orphaned-well solicitations dominate the code's activity in 2026, with all four contracts requiring Davis-Bacon prevailing wage compliance and best-value award evaluation based on key personnel qualifications (25 points), business-owned equipment capability (25 points), technical experience (25 points), and vendor questions responses (25 points), with an 80-point minimum threshold for award consideration. Prequalification gating is a persistent requirement, with prior RFP award or small-business registration mandated across most state-issued notices. Federal funding through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and Department of Interior Orphaned Wells Program is explicitly cited in Mississippi and Texas procurements, triggering Davis-Bacon Act and Build America Buy America Act compliance. The code shows sustained activity driven by federal remediation funding but remains concentrated in a small number of state environmental and oil-and-gas regulatory agencies; individual opportunity cycles are short (five to ten days between posting and response deadline typical for direct solicitations and IFBs).