Democrats push Roan protections
By Jerd Smith, Rocky Mountain News
Originally published 05:27 p.m., April 17, 2008
Updated 12:33 a.m., April 18, 2008
Three Colorado Democrats will push federal legislation to require the state's Roan Plateau to be leased for energy development in phases and to expand lands designated as critical for wildlife habitat.
The package mirrors most of the provisions Gov. Bill Ritter has said he wants in place before more gas drilling begins. Ritter's requests were rejected by the Bureau of Land Management last month, prompting the current action by Sen. Ken Salazar and Reps. John Salazar and Mark Udall.
Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., has not signed onto the proposal, but spokesman Steve Wymer said the senator might support the bill after he's had a chance to review it.
"There's lots of room for compromise," said Wymer. "But we got this 45 minutes ago and this is an 18-page bill."
In addition to requiring phased leasing and expanded land protections, the bill would require the BLM to lease less environmentally sensitive areas first and ensure that stringent reclamation standards have been met before new rounds of leasing begin.
Rep. Salazar said the hope is that requiring drilling on less-sensitive areas first will provide more time to find less-damaging ways to extract natural gas from the more fragile regions of the scenic plateau in western Colorado.
But industry advocates say the legislation would delay energy development and could threaten millions of dollars in lease payments Colorado would receive if the current plan were allowed to take effect.
"This legislation doesn't create anything new, but it does create new rule-making and that will push it into next year," said Greg Schnacke, president of Americans For American Energy, a nonprofit advocacy group for domestic energy production.
smithj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5474
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April 18, 2008
10:49 a.m.
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justright writes:
The guv is in a pickle,
He has already spent the tax revenue stream on higher education and local infrastucture according to recent legistation here in Colorado. Remember the Science Build hole and Aururia? Remember how fast they found 137 million dollars to build the science building? Remember where the money was coming from? Mineral leases which currently is heavily weighted on the Roan Plateau.
So it looks like either Higher ED is screwed again or he is pandering to enviro nuts. Remember there has already been 7 years of planning and replanning on the Roan project. It is one of the most restrictive operations ever under taken.
At this point the only reason to oppose this is to stop it all together.
Can you say $500.00 a month or higher Xcel bills?
April 21, 2008
1:17 p.m.
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prk166 writes:
Well, as long as the NG is in the ground it's not going anywhere. Delay's in extracting it will delay the revenues but it doesn't look likely that we'll miss out on them completely as long as they do occur at some point.
That said, I don't see how much more protected things can get than they are today. I understand that some legislatures and enviro groups feel that there isn't enough land set aside for wildlife. But at this point I see no reason for their claims necessitating more delays. The BLM's taken more than plenty of time to put this plan together and has plenty of their own experts in house to get things done right. Seems more like political posturing by the Dems assuming that people have yet to associate excessive regulation as playing a large role in their rocketing energy prices.