RBC | Over the rolling hills of Highway 13 and down the Piceance Creek road on County Road 26, is where Colorado Mesa University’s Land Energy Management Club recently toured Terra Energy’s state-of-the-art fracking system in Rio Blanco County. The visit provided insights into the company’s innovative methods for reducing[Read More…]
Tag: Fracking
Area gas development big driver behind state’s $393M in resource revenue
RBC | Colorado was the source of nearly $400 million in federal energy and other natural resource revenue in the recently concluded 2022 federal fiscal year, with natural gas development in Garfield County alone accounting for about a quarter of that revenue. According to Department of Interior Office of Natural[Read More…]
County Beat: Pharmacy closure causes a stir
PHARMACY The closure of Meeker Drugs, the town’s only pharmacy, has left many residents wondering where they would get medication. Pioneers Medical Center isn’t expected to open their own pharmacy until sometime in the spring, which leaves a months-long gap in service. Seeking to address the issue until the new[Read More…]
Writers On the Range: Restoration Economy
RBC | Farmington, a city of 45,000 in the northwestern corner of New Mexico, has run on a fossil fuel economy for a century. It is one of the only places on the planet where a 26-kiloton nuclear device was detonated underground to free up natural gas from the rock.[Read More…]
Oil and gas wastewater spills in the Piceance Basin topped 700K gallons last year
RBC | About twice a week, oil and gas operators in Colorado’s Piceance Basin file “Form 19” also called a Spill/Release Report with the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC). Nine times out of 10, the spilled substance is a form of hazardous waste byproduct called produced water. For[Read More…]
A Look at the West: Anti-frackers undermining Colorado’s environmental progress
RBC I Fear-mongering has been the favored tactic of environmental activists in their zeal to defend local fracking bans.
Residents can report oil, gas health issues
RBC I Colorado has been something of a pioneer in terms of tracking health risks related to oil and gas production. In 2010, it was the “first in the nation to perform a detailed study” known as a “health impact assessment” on proposed natural gas development.
One Man’s Opinion: Bad facts cloud reality about fracking
RBC I The American Southwest is undergoing a spike in seismic activity. A new U.S. Geological Survey shows that a small basin on the New Mexico-Colorado border experienced 20 times more serious earthquakes between 2001 and 2011 than it had during the previous 30 years.
Uintah Basin faces a tricky problem with oil, gas industry
RBC I On a crisp fall day lined with cottonwoods as yellow-bright as balls of flame, I take a gravel shortcut from Utah’s Nine Mile Canyon toward Vernal, an energy boomtown of some 10,000 souls.
Guest Editorial: Recent fracking information was alarming, but it isn’t true
RBC I University of Maryland researchers just concluded that hydraulic fracturing—the process of shaking oil and gas free from below—could endanger the health of nearby residents by exposing them to air and water pollution. This would certainly be cause for alarm, if true.
Guest Editorial: Facts on fracking are ignored; fear is only tool for environmentalists
RBC I Researchers in Colorado just came forward with a shocking claim: hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” the decades-old method of using a high-velocity mixture of water, sand and chemicals to blast through rock to release oil and gas deposits, causes birth defects. There’s just one hitch: it isn’t true.
Group challenges BLM policy regarding drilling
TAOS, NEW MEXICO I On Monday a broad-based coalition of 45 local and national organizations called on the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to make fully transparent the process where private interests nominate public lands for oil and gas drilling and fracking.
