Energy Bill UPDATE

“Such giveaways to a fully mature and outrageously prosperous industry are egregious when juxtaposed with the first federal education budget cuts in a decade, totaling half a billion dollars this year. ”

Source: LA Times

Raton Basin [southern Colorado, northern New Mexico] landowners charge that their water wells are being polluted by seeping methane gas from coal-seam outcrops. The ranchers also complain their crop fields and yards are becoming “hot spots” of accumulating gas. Their concerns have reached the ears of Las Animas County commissioners and members of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. The Legislature is exploring gas industry issues and may develop a bill to give counties and surface owners more protection from environmental hazards associated with gas drilling.

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“Our crops are not growing at all,” she said. “We had been trying to grow gourmet garlic for commercial purposes and used to have 3,000 to 4,000 plants. Now all of it is dead. We used to have alfalfa but it doesn’t grow there either. The only thing that’s there now is thistle.” She said that the seeping methane gas hot spots are definitely visible in their field. “We have a water well and all around the well there are little holes where the gas bubbles up when it’s wet,” Saint said. The state is installing vents in their home to address possible leakages of methane gas, which is tasteless, odorless and colorless. She said their land is about a mile away from the closest drilling sites and that so far gas company officials have not done anything to help them with the situation.

[snip]

Manzanares said he’s also concerned with channeled water emanating from the gas extraction process flowing to holding ponds that may be killing vegetation and nearby trees due to its methane gas content. “I have no scientific basis for charging that the operators are responsible but it’s still very coincidental that these vegetation kills are occurring in several areas.”

George Mondragon Jr.He said landowners may be able to seek relief from a state recovery fund that gas industry operators pay into for environmental mediation. “The Legislature could give local boards and commissioners authority to recover damages over gas that may have come into homes and water wells or damaged crops.”

Source: Pueblo Chieftain (CO)

Consultants paid by the oil and gas industry have been volunteering to work for the Bureau of Land Management’s Vernal office for the past five months, expediting environmental studies to keep pace with a glut of drilling requests in the region.

[snip]

The arrangement takes place amid a crush of companies clamoring to drill for oil and gas in the Uinta Basin, and an agency whose budget has been cut in the midst of the stampede.

   Facing a backlog of about 400 permits in the Vernal field office, a handful of small oil and gas companies pooled their resources through their trade group, Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States, to hire the consultants through SWCA Environmental Consulting to “volunteer” in the Vernal office.

   The consultants – experts in archaeology, paleontology, geology and wildlife biology – went to work in mid-February and committed to work full time for three months, according to documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. IPAMS has since extended the contract on a month-to-month basis.

Source: Salt Lake Tribune

BLM spokesman Hans Stuart acknowledged that plan is not complete because the agency needs to gather more information about industry interest and potential future development.

     “That’s why we’re offering just one parcel” for lease, he said. “The very limited leasing is key to getting an implementation plan.”

     Stuart also said the BLM is not rushing to drill but has spent six years developing a management plan.

     “The groups [environmental and local citizen groups] are using hysteria and deliberate distortion to promote their views,” he said. “BLM manages its lands for all of the public, not just groups that are using this issue for political purposes or to raise funds.”

[emphasis mine]

Source: Albuquerque Journal

The Bureau of Land Management is seeking funding from industry to cover the cost of processing onshore oil and gas permitting — a plan already drawing fire from some domestic energy producers.

 The bureau plans to announce a regulatory proposal tomorrow that would charge thousands of dollars in fees for oil and gas development permits on federal lands. The proposal calls for eventually charging $4,000 for Applications for Permits to Drill (APD), as well as other fees for geophysical exploration permits and geothermal drilling permits.

[snip]

When fully phased in, the draft proposal — which will have a 30-day public comment period — would recover about $23.5 million more each year in mineral processing funds than existing rules, the bureau said.

 But it is already under attack. Dan Naatz, the director of federal resources for the Independent Petroleum Association of America, said the fees could slow production, especially from smaller companies, even though oil and gas prices are high today.

Source: E&E News