The Final BLM Uncompahgre Resource Management Plan (RMP) and Record of Decision for over 675,800 surface acres and 971,220 acres of federal subsurface mineral estate within the Uncompahgre Planning Area was released on April 10, 2020.
 
“This RMP is the single-most important economic driver, which will dictate the future of Delta County and the North Fork Valley for the next 20 years. This Final Proposed RMP opens 95% of the federal mineral estate to oil and gas development, with unacceptably low protections for our watershed, our public health, wildlife resources, and climate.
 
The Final RMP and Record of Decision are available here for review.
 
“It makes no climate, ecological or economic sense to drill in the North Fork Valley,” said Natasha Léger, executive director of Citizens for a Healthy Community. “This is exactly the type of federal action that is responsible for accelerating climate and environmental degradation, which cannot be allowed to stand if we have any hope of protecting present and future generations, rare and irreplaceable ecosystems like the North Fork, and meeting Colorado’s goals for a clean and renewable energy future.”
 
The plan ignores 42,000 public comments in opposition, as well as problems identified in the groups’ July protest. The agency refused to consider alternatives to curb fossil-fuel leasing and failed to analyze how expanding fracking and drilling could harm organic agriculture, the climate and endangered species like the Colorado pikeminnow and Gunnison sage grouse. The conservation groups are asking the BLM to redo its environmental impact statement and support a plan that recommends no new leasing.
 
“The Uncompahgre land-management plan gives the initial greenlight to widespread, long-term oil and gas development in the ecologically sensitive North Fork Valley,” said Melissa Hornbein with the Western Environmental Law Center. “This plan, unconscionable as the connections between fossil fuel emissions and global climate change become clearer every day, has the potential to exponentially increase greenhouse gas pollution in the region over the next decade, when we need to be drastically reducing emissions.
 
Stay tuned for more information.