02 Apr ICYMI – Important News Stories from the Past Few Weeks
April 2, 2015 –
Bakken.com – Nebraskan farmer invites pro-fracking panel to sample tainted water
“Last week Nebraskan James Osborne came before a panel of pro-fracking board members, part of the Nebraska Oil & Gas Conservation committee to show the difference between the clean, pure water Nebraskan’s drink now, versus water they would drink after it has been contaminated with fracking chemicals.” READ MORE & WATCH THE VIDEO
High Country News – Lessons from boom and bust in New Mexico
“Aztec is the smallest of a triad of towns that include Farmington, population 45,000, and Bloomfield, population 8,000, in the heart of the San Juan Basin, 10,000 square miles of mesas and canyons and scrub-covered high-desert plains that sprawl across much of northwestern New Mexico and into Colorado. The region’s shale, sandstone and coal beds, souvenirs of an ancient inland sea and its swampy shoreline, store vast quantities of coal, oil and, especially, natural gas, which is so abundant it seeps out of the earth unbidden in places. For nearly a century, the economic fortunes of these three communities have hinged on fossil fuel extraction. While environmental regulations, national policy and subsidies for energy companies can affect the situation, nothing does so more than the price of the commodities.” READ MORE
From the Styx Blog – Garfield County FLIR Tour: Garfield Creek
What can’t be seen with the naked eye is shown in these FLIR videos venting from gas facilities in Garfield County. READ MORE
High Country News – BLM’s new fracking rules strike middle ground
“After four years of study and 1.5 million public comments, the U.S. Department of Interior on March 20 unveiled new rules governing hydraulic fracturing of oil and natural gas resources overseen by the Bureau of Land Management. While the first official draft was fairly protective and a second was significantly weakened, this final version appears to be squarely between the two – predictably falling short of what many environmental groups hoped for, and going beyond what industry groups seem willing to live with.” READ MORE
“‘Right now the industry holds leases on just over 34 million acres of public lands, an area roughly the size of Florida, though it is only producing from about one of three of those acres,’ [Neil] Kornze of the BLM told the House subcommittee last week.”
“It was grill and drill time in the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural Resources. Members grilled Bureau of Land Management Director Neil Kornze and U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell March 26 on the agencies’ proposed budgets. And Chairman Doug Lamborn of Colorado and other members had an emphatic answer to managing public lands and boosting the economy – ‘Drill!'” READ MORE
Colorado Farm & Food Alliance Blog – Fracking in the North Fork Valley
CHC member and author Eugenia Bone was featured in a blog post recently. Her take on our community’s efforts to protect the North Fork: “I know it can be disheartening to have to keep fighting the same battles over, but each win is actually progress. For now, the North Fork has shown that rural communities can stand up to powerful interests. But we can’t relax our efforts until the threat of industrialization is gone.” READ MORE
Denver Business Journal – Opponents blister business-backed ballot-reform measure in Colorado Legislature
“A business-backed bill that would require the state to assign fiscal-impact statements to citizen-generated ballot initiatives hangs in the balance after citizen activists piled into a committee hearing … and accused supporters — including Gov. John Hickenlooper — of trying to push the bill through the Legislature to protect the oil and gas industry.” READ MORE
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