80,000 get e-mail survey on spending Roan proceeds

Gargi Chakrabarty

Published November 29, 2007 at 12:05 a.m.

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A whopping 80,000 Colorado voters this week will receive a survey from an energy lobby asking how they would like to spend the $1 billion the lobby says Colorado would earn from oil and gas drilling on top of the Roan Plateau.

The survey by Americans for American Energy, a Golden- based lobby formed recently to promote more domestic drilling, including on top of the Roan Plateau, will be e-mailed.

A recent study by the lobby suggested Colorado could earn more than $1 billion in revenue during the first year if a federal government plan to open the top of the plateau for drilling proceeds. The AAE estimate, however, has been criticized by environmental groups and Gov. Bill Ritter's office.

"$1 billion could change the fiscal landscape for Colorado," AAE President Greg Schnacke said. "We believe the (federal) drilling proposal should go forward."

Ritter has 120 days to review the federal plan. The review period will be over in mid-December, and at that time Ritter may or may not comment on the plan, spokesman Evan Dreyer said.

Dreyer said he doesn't know if the AAE survey, to be compiled over a month, is timed to put pressure on Ritter to agree with the federal plan.

"I would not pretend to ascribe any motive to any action that group takes. They are so far off the map when it comes to serious fact-based discussion that it is impossible to take them seriously," Dreyer said, referring to the AAE.

"It is difficult to give anything they do any credibility because they are using a figure that is artificially inflated, presumably for political gain. They refuse to reveal the source of the (revenue) figure, the methodology. We haven't seen anything that comes close to that."

Schnacke, however, said the AAE's revenue estimate was calculated by asking oil and gas companies operating near the Roan Plateau how much money they would bid if the federal government were to lease the top of the plateau. The companies responded on condition of confidentiality, he said. Also, the estimate took into account the bids on comparable leases in the vicinity of the Roan.

"Our job is to educate the public about the facts," Schnacke said. "We are not here to roll over because it is politically expedient."

• November 29, 2007

  5:19 p.m.

  Suggest removal

  WEST_SLOPE writes:

  Speculative revenues from even more leasing on the Roan Plateau are a drop in the bucket of total revenues flowing to Colorado from oil and gas leasing and development. The real stories aren’t mentioned in this article. AAE’s “facts” and methodology could just as easily cite polls of children under 6 to prove that Santa Claus is real.

  First, according to BLM, more than 95% of federal lands in the Roan Plateau region have been leased for oil and gas development since 1998. According to the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, 2,002 new drilling permits have already been approved for Garfield County alone in 2007. That’s 39% of all permits in the State and almost triple the 796 permits approved in 2004. Aren’t Garfield County and northwest Colorado already absorbing more than their fair share of impacts, without sacrificing Roan Plateau?

  Second, Colorado is leaving hundreds of millions on the table every year. Our antiquated severance tax structure charges only a fraction of the rates assessed by neighboring Rocky Mountain states, such as Wyoming and New Mexico. Why isn’t Colorado asking industry to pay it’s fair share? The real discussion is how to allocate the additional revenues reaped from reasonable severance policies.

  Third, Colorado’s economic health and quality of life depends on building tomorrow’s New Energy Economy. Trashing our spectacular public lands and wildlife to suck more gas out of the ground is a bad deal for our kids. Governor Ritter gets it, and citizens support his vision to make Colorado the national leader on renewables, conservation and efficiency. The New Energy Economy benefits everybody.

  That’s the story AAE doesn’t want us to hear. A more accurate name might be “Hired Guns Trying to Fool the Public into Sacrificing Colorado’s Water, Wildlife and Communities to Improve the Bottom Line of Big Oil, Already Awash in Record Profits.” The vast majority of revenues earned from Colorado’s non-renewable fossil fuels are shipped out-of-state or out of the country. Another piece of the story AAE doesn’t want us to know.

  Calculated as a percentage of total mineral activity in Garfield County, BLM projects that new federal leases on the Roan would only account for approximately 6-15% of total natural gas production (depending on the range of values used for production and price assumptions).

  For the backcountry hunting paradise and native trout habitat on top of Roan Plateau, projected revenues from predicted drilling over the next 20 years would amount to about 1% of oil and gas revenues in the County. At the base, Governor Ritter is expected to direct BLM to implement the Division of Wildlife’s scientific recommendations for protecting elk and mule deer habitat. BLM needs to listen.

  That's why informed citizens support the elected officials working on Colorado solutions to protect the Roan Plateau, by balancing oil and gas development with conservation.

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