J. MILLARD TAWES, Governor                     1025

diate preservation of the public health and safety, and having been
passed by a yea and nay vote supported by three-fifths of the mem-
bers elected to each of the two Houses of the General Assembly of
Maryland, the same shall take effect from the date of its passage.

Approved May 4, 1965.

CHAPTER 712
(House Bill 486)

AN ACT to add new Sections 695A to 695M, inclusive, to Article
66C of the Annotated Code of Maryland (1957 Edition), title
"Natural Resources," subtitle "Gas and Oil," to follow immediately
after Section 695 thereof, and to be under the new subheading
"Prince George's County Underground Storage Act," to authorize
gas storage companies, as defined, to acquire by eminent domain
subject to certain limitations, the use of any privately owned and
any publicly owned geological strata lying not less than 800 feet
below the surface of a maximum of 12,000 acres of land within
a specified area of Prince George's County, for underground stor-
age of gas; requiring as a condition precedent CONDITIONS
PRECEDENT to the taking by eminent domain of the use of such
strata, a finding by the Public Service Commission that the under-
ground storage project is in the public interest; AND AN UNDER-
GROUND STORAGE PERMIT authorizing public bodies, as de-
fined, to grant the use of such strata owned by them to gas storage
companies; making provision as to the property rights in and
taxation of gas injected into underground storage in Prince
George's County, and as to the rights of landowners; TO PRO-
VIDE FOR THE CAPTURE OF SUCH GAS IN CERTAIN
COUNTIES OF THE STATE and relating generally to the under-
ground storage of gas in Prince George's County.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Maryland,
That new Sections 695A to 695M, inclusive, be and they are hereby
added to the Article 66C of the Annotated Code of Maryland (1957
Edition), title "Natural Resources," subtitle "Gas and Oil," to follow
immediately after Section 695 thereof, and to be under the new sub-
heading "Prince George's County Underground Storage Act," and
all to read as follows:

695A. In This Subheading—

(a)  "Gas" means natural gas or manufactured gas of any combi-
nation or mixture thereof, whether or not the natural gas has been
processed by removal of component parts not essential to its use for
light, heat, or power.

(b)   "Underground storage" or "underground storage of gas"
means the storing of gas in a geological stratum or strata beneath
the surface of the earth, together with all operations necessary or
convenient therefor, including but not by way of limitation the
following: acquisition, preparation, alteration, maintenance, utiliza-
tion, and operation of an underground storage reservoir for the stor-