As earthmoving equipment worked to go deeper and deeper, curiosity grew among residents of Bloomfield as to exactly what was happening along First Street and Arizona Avenue.
City administrators remained mum, preferring to let the private owner of the project address exactly what was going on.
On Tuesday, Brock Brockinton, owner of B8D LLC, flew in from Little Rock, Arkansas, and agreed to share some information about the project.
It will be a sand processing facility, Brockinton said. “We will process the sand for the oil and gas industry to be used in fracking.”
In fracking, sand is used as a “proppant.” In more laymen’s terms, Brockinton explained what role sand plays in the fracking process. “In fracking, they pump sand into the well bore and it acts as a prop, so as they go down and they fracture the formation they pump the sand in to widen those fractures and hold them open so that the hydrocarbons can flow more freely,” he said.
How did a company based in Little Rock find Bloomfield
Brockinton has been involved in this type of work for the oil and gas industry for more than a decade.
“We’ve been involved in a couple of these operations over the years,” he said, and a local operator reached out and asked us to have a look around and see if there might be a local path to providing something here close by. So we came up earlier this year and started looking at a number of properties and ultimately found this one.”
Brockinton said his company tested 12 to 14 local sites. They found the qualities were all very similar in nature, so they then looked to proximity in relation to area development. They then looked at a couple of other aspects including water availability and trucking ingress and egress – “the ability to get on the road and get moving,” he said.
According to property records at the San Juan County Assessor’s office, the two adjacent parcels purchased by B8D LLC is a total of 157 acres of nonresidential land.
In working with their engineers, the company has been working toward getting the grade down and forming the land to fit their operation. “That’s where we are right now, mostly it’s been doing dirt work,” he said.
“For the most part, we have gotten down to bedrock in most areas,” he said, noting they have learned that the area has some settling issues and existing structures along the way have actually started to sink a little bit. “So it is important for us to get down as well as it will better insulate our operation from the town itself, so that is what we have been working toward, just getting the grade down. That is 90% complete. In the next few days you will see a lot of the large earthmoving equipment phase out and start seeing more grading equipment as we start to grade everything to where it is ready for the next phase.”
“It’s coming together,” Brockinton said, “as an area in the whole it looks like we are very fortunate to be in Bloomfield.”
The company has utilized local labor for this project so far and will be looking to hire locally once they get into operation, he said.
George Duncan, city manager of Bloomfield, said that the city itself had been interested in purchasing the property that B8D secured.
“We have had a lot of discussions with the city, and I think they are excited by our projects. We have some plans to work with them on the development of part of our acreage, so we are excited to announce those plans here in the coming days,” Brockinton said.
They have started conceptualizing some plans, and once they get more data they will announce some additional details, which Brockinton expects to do shortly. “We intend to invite our neighbors out and do a meet-and-greet.”
“We see potential in the San Juan Basin,” he said. Noting that although the oil and gas industry has been established in the area for a very long time, “there seems to be a resurgence in the area in terms of activity, and we think some of the new exploration programs are showing good results. We think there’s a good opportunity to help this Basin with a local product that should provide them cost savings and support increased activity.”
As to the name, what does B8D stand for? “It’s a play on Bloomfield, actually. So if you take B and add eight characters and add a D on the end, you have Bloomfield,” Brockinton said with a smile.
In the meantime, stay tuned for additional details as they are released.
