When the La Plata Board of County Commissioners considers the details of the Chapter 90 regulations, I hope they keep the intent of the rules in mind, which is to make sure that oil and gas development is done in a manner that protects the health and safety of those nearby. The fact that they are even considering rules at this point implies that the current rules are not doing the job.
The truth is, there are currently over 3,000 active wells in La Plata County, many of which have been here for over 60 years. There is absolutely no evidence that people living near those wells are in any danger whatsoever. The environmentalists who are screaming for larger setbacks don’t have one single out-of-compliance air sample to support their cause. Their weapons are innuendo and fear mongering.
Here is an example of keeping the intent in mind. Specifically, who are the rules meant to protect? Anyone living within 2,000 feet of a proposed well already must give permission before an operator can get a drilling permit. The state then allows a well pad within 500 feet of a building, with the ability to get within 200 feet with a variance. The environmentalists are asking the county for a hard 500-foot setback with no allowance for a variance.
But the people the rule is trying to protect – those living nearby – have already signed off on the drilling of the well. They will also have to sign off on any variance, and if they do so, it is because they might prefer the well be on the edge of their field rather than in the middle of it, even though it may put the well closer to their barn or their home. Further, a hard setback would prohibit the landowner from building anything within 500 feet of an existing well, which would render a minimum of 20 acres around any existing well unusable.
The reason the county is even considering new regulations is not that they are needed but that the environmentalists are insisting on it. Ironically, the activists have absolutely no interest in seeing that new wells get drilled safely. Their true goal is to eliminate all oil and gas development, despite the fact that they still rely on fossil fuels for 80% of their energy. That is dangerously backward.
Like Kodak film, when the technology and the infrastructure develop to the point that oil and gas is no longer needed, the industry will go away all on its own. Until then, we still need to drill wells, and there is no better, cleaner, safer place to drill them than in Colorado, which has the toughest regulations on the planet. Further, when we drill them here, it is Colorado communities that get the taxes, Colorado citizens who get the jobs and Colorado landowners who get the royalties.
Hopefully, the commission will ignore the never-ending noise in their ear holes from the activists and will ensure that the rules are reasonable, flexible, and allow for the safe and responsible development of the vast natural gas resources in La Plata County.
George Sharpe is an investment manager at Merrion Oil & Gas in Farmington.
