[San Miguel] County changes panel after criticism

By David Giuliani, Las Vegas Optic

The San Miguel County Commission this week decided to change the composition of its oil gas task force after some contended that it was heavily weighted toward the industry.

County officials said they wanted to change the makeup of the 10-member task force after they received disclosure forms from applicants.

In April, the commission formed the task force to make recommendations for an ordinance that would deal specifically with oil and gas drilling. No requests for drilling are pending, but there are some in neighboring counties.

Industry opponents said last month that one of the members, Jeffrey Mills of the Environment Department, shouldn’t be classified as representing environmental concerns. Mills spent years discovering oil in the Gulf of Mexico and is a beneficiary of oil and gas royalties in Texas and Louisiana.

Mills, who maintains that he has no oil and gas interests in New Mexico, has been reclassified as an industry representative, taking the place of John Michael Richardson of Petroleum and Mineral Land Services, who is no longer on the task force.

Kim Kirkpatrick, a retired Highlands University professor, is taking Mills’ spot as one of the two environmental representatives.

Pat Leahan of the Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center, who had criticized the task force’s composition, is now one of three citizen representatives on the panel, replacing David Blagg, a former general contractor from Sapello, who is no longer listed as a member.

Blagg said he hadn’t been able to get an answer about why he was removed from the panel. He speculated that he may have been nixed because he has investments in mutual funds with some ties to oil and gas. But he said those investments don’t amount to much.

Blagg said he wanted to be on the task force because he is concerned about oil and gas leases through the Santa Fe Opera on land near his Sapello property.

“I probably would have been the most conservation-minded of people on the task force. I really want there to be strict and serious encumbering limitations (on oil and gas), especially with bonding,” he said, adding that he was disappointed he didn’t make the task force.

Leahan said in an e-mail to county officials this week that she, too, was disappointed that Blagg couldn’t remain on the panel. She said he could bring valuable acequia experience to the table.

Alex Tafoya, the county’s planning and zoning supervisor, said the changes were made to balance the task force.

Leahan said she was pleased with the panel’s reshaping.

“We should also be mindful as we move forward that a wider range of local voices needs to be heard — not just heard, but honored,” she said in an e-mail. “Those who have worked for generations to protect the land, water, culture and way of life for the people of this region must play a key role in shaping what happens next regarding the oil and gas industry in San Miguel County.”

She urged the county to keep the task force “open and transparent.”

During this week’s commission meeting, Commissioner Nicolas Leger said he believed the task force was balanced. But he said he was sure that some people would differ with that conclusion.



members of task force


Oil industry

• Karin Foster, Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico

• Jeffrey Mills, Las Vegas resident with oil and gas royalties


Environmental and educational

• Kim Kirkpatrick, retired Highlands University professor

• Ken Bentson, Highlands University forestry professor


Citizens

• Pat Leahan, Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center

• Ernesto Borunda, retired, Sapello

• Larry Webb, Newkirk, N.M.


County representatives

• Nicolas Leger, county commissioner

• Les Montoya, county manager

• Alex Tafoya, planning and zoning supervisor

Visit the Las Vegas Optic>>>

EPA Press Release--EPA Announces a Schedule of Public Meetings on Hydraulic Fracturing Research Study

CONTACT:
Enesta Jones
jones.enesta@epa.gov
202-564-7873
202-564-4355

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 18, 2010

EPA Announces a Schedule of Public Meetings on Hydraulic Fracturing Research Study

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is hosting four public information meetings on the proposed study of the relationship between hydraulic fracturing and its potential impacts on drinking water. Hydraulic fracturing is a process that helps production of natural gas or oil from shale and other geological formations. By pumping fracturing fluids (water and chemical additives) and sand or other similar materials into rock formations, fractures are created that allow natural gas or oil to flow from the rock through the fractures to a production well for extraction. The meetings will provide public information about the proposed study scope and design. EPA will solicit public comments on the draft study plan.

The public meetings will be held on:

July 8 from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. CDT at the Hilton Fort Worth in Fort Worth, Texas
July 13 from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. MDT at the Marriot Tech Center’s Rocky Mountain Events Center in Denver, Colo.
July 22 from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. EDT at the Hilton Garden Inn in Canonsburg, Pa.
August 12 at the Anderson Performing Arts Center at Binghamton University in Binghamton, N.Y. for 3 sessions - 8 a.m. to 12 p.m., 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., and 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. EDT

Natural gas plays a key role in our nation’s clean energy future and hydraulic fracturing is one way of accessing this vital resource. However, serious concerns have been raised about hydraulic fracturing’s potential impact on drinking water, human health and the environment. To address these concerns, EPA announced in March that it will study the potential adverse impact that hydraulic fracturing may have on drinking water.

To support the initial planning phase and guide the development of the study plan, the agency sought suggestions and comments from the EPA Science Advisory Board (SAB)—an independent, external federal advisory committee. The agency will use this advice and extensive stakeholder input to guide the design of the study.

Stakeholders are requested to pre-register for the meetings at least 72 hours before each meeting.

Click here for more information

Onshore accidents add to concerns

Onshore accidents involving oil and gas extraction are nothing new. Unlike the BP disaster; however, they usually get little to no attention outside the immediate area where the accident or problem occurs.

By BRETT CLANTON
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
June 13, 2010, 5:10PM
A string of accidents this month at natural gas operations on land could not have come at a worse time for Houston’s vast energy industry.

With BP’s massive oil spill already prompting questions about the safety of offshore drilling in deep waters, a key growth area for the sector in recent years, the natural gas accidents are bringing new scrutiny to a business that may be even more important to the local oil and gas economy.

The incidents include two well accidents in the Marcellus Shale play in the Northeast U.S. that have reinforced regional concerns about gas drilling. Last week, two fatal gas pipeline accidents in North Texas also focused public attention on dangers associated with infrastructure used to transport the fossil fuel.

It’s not clear whether those incidents will draw onshore gas operations into the push for tighter regulation that the offshore industry already is facing amid the unfolding disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

But they do represent another setback for an industry desperate to repair its image and to reassure Americans that domestic oil and gas resources can be developed safely.

“Right now, the industry just can’t afford any more mistakes,” said Michelle Foss, chief energy economist and head of the Center for Energy Economics at the University of Texas’ Jackson School of Geosciences.

Greater scrutiny on land-based natural gas operations comes as offshore drilling practices are already under the microscope. In late May, federal regulators announced a six-month ban on deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.

That was in response to the April 20 blowout at BP’s Macondo well in mile-deep waters off the Louisiana coast that killed 11 workers aboard the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig and started the biggest oil spill in U.S. history.

Government action has idled 33 rigs currently permitted to drill in the deep-water Gulf, which could result in tens of thousands of job losses across the Gulf region, say industry groups.

In Houston, the impact of the ban, along with temporary delays in shallow-water drilling, could cost 25,000 to 80,000 jobs, said Lee Hunt, president of the International Association of Drilling Contractors.

Recent accidents
No one is predicting that kind of fallout from the recent slate of onshore accidents, but they haven’t gone unnoticed either.

In Texas last week, two people were killed and three injured after a natural gas pipeline owned by DCP Midstream Partners exploded near the town of Darrouzett when a bulldozer accidentally hit it.

The day before, one person died when a power line contractor inadvertently struck a pipeline near Cleburne that was partly owned by Houston’s Enterprise Products Partners LP.

Elsewhere, a fire raged for five days last week at a rig near Moundsville, W.Va., after workers hit a pocket of methane while drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus Shale. Seven were injured, and state officials cited the permit holder, AB Resources, for not following submitted well plans.

Also, Houston’s EOG Resources was ordered by Pennsylvania officials to halt all drilling in the state after a June 3 blowout spewed natural gas and chemicals out of a well for 16 hours before it was secured. The state has since allowed the firm to resume some drilling.

‘Accelerated’ concerns
Prior to that incident, concerns about offshore drilling safety were already starting to transfer to the onshore realm, but the EOG blowout “appears to have accelerated this trend,” wrote Kevin Book, industry analyst with Clearview Energy Partners, in a report last week.

Indeed, a handful of federal lawmakers are moving forward with bills to place greater restrictions on a drilling technique called hydraulic fracturing, and environmental groups are seeing an opening.

“It just demonstrates that we’re at a point where the extraction of fossil fuels is very risky, whether it’s deep-well drilling under the ocean or hydraulic fracturing, that our dependence on fossil fuels comes with some significant risks,” said Larisa Ruoff, with Green Century Capital Management, a Boston-based investment advisory firm. The firm is trying, through shareholder proposals, to push oil and gas companies to disclose more about risks associated with hydraulic fracturing.

While proponents say hydraulic fracturing has been key in unlocking dense shale rock formations that have greatly boosted U.S. natural gas supplies, critics have raised concerns about the millions of gallons of water required to fracture each shale gas well and about possible contamination of groundwater supplies by chemicals injected into the rock.

Effect in Houston
If new regulation arises, Houston undoubtedly will feel it.

The city’s energy industry is full of small and mid-sized exploration and production companies, as well as larger players, that have made big bets on shale gas. They, in turn, support hundreds of other service providers and equipment makers with headquarters here.

“Houston is the epicenter for shale gas technology development,” said David Pursell, managing director of Houston investment bank Tudor Pickering Holt & Co.

The fear in the natural gas industry is that the latest string of onshore accidents will erase momentum it had made in building support for natural gas as a clean, abundant alternative to crude oil.

“These kinds of events give environmentalists a mail-order funding cause,” said Porter Bennett, CEO of Bentek Energy, an energy market research firm in Evergreen, Colo. “That’s not a good thing from the gas industry’s standpoint.”

But Aubrey McClendon, CEO of Chesapeake Energy Corp., the nation’s second-largest natural gas producer, said while the recent accidents are regrettable, he doesn’t believe they will have a meaningful impact on the industry.

“You want to have no accidents ever, but as long as humans are involved and you’re dealing with great unknowns underneath the earth, you’re going to have some surprising things happen,” he said.

“The question is what do you do with it? If BP had been able to control that spill in a day, we wouldn’t be talking about the BP incident today.”

brett.clanton@chron.com

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TCEQ botches air quality oversight

Decisions about Texas air quality ought to be made in Texas, not in Washington. Unfortunately, the bumbling efforts of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality under Gov. Rick Perry have invited an Environmental Protection Agency takeover of the air-pollution permitting process in the Lone Star State.
For 15 years, Texas has operated an air-pollution-permitting program that lacks EPA approval required by the federal Clean Air Act. The program began under Ann Richards and continued under George W. Bush and Perry.

At issue is TCEQ's use of flexible permitting that measures emissions from a group of emission points at a facility rather than from a specific emission point. That allows individual smokestacks to far exceed pollution standards as long as the groups they are in collectively meet them.

The EPA, under the Bush administration, warned state officials and flexible permit holders about potential non-compliance. Perry chose to ignore those warnings. Now the EPA is threatening to take control of the process.

Perry mistakenly sees this as yet another example of the unbridled exercise of federal power. It's a good campaign sound bite, but it doesn't reflect the reality of the failure of leadership — handpicked by Perry — at TCEQ.

This is the same TCEQ that has outraged residents of North Texas by failing to disclose errors in air quality testing related to gas drilling in the Barnett Shale. And it is the same TCEQ that has fought a legitimate open records request from Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, to turn over records of agency officials who met with representatives of a copper smelter company while it had an air emission application pending.

Perry and TCEQ officials claim the EPA takeover is unwarranted because Texas has one of the most successful clean air programs in the nation [I suggest visiting Bluedaze Drilling Reform for Texas if you are curious about all that great air Texas residents are breathing]. Perhaps they're correct. But given TCEQ's track record, Texas residents and federal authorities have every reason to be skeptical.
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Salazar Declares Shallow Water Drilling “Safe,” Lifts Drilling Injunction, Conceals Shallow Water Oil Spill Currently Fouling Gulf

Really?!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 8, 2010
3:10 PM

Taylor Energy Spill Has Caused 10-mile Slick, Is Still Spewing Oil
TUSCON, AZ - June 8 - On May 6, 2010, the U.S. Department of the Interior placed a partial moratorium on shallow and deepwater drilling in response to the April 20, 2010 explosion of BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling project. Interior defines “shallow-water drilling” as occurring in less than 500 feet of water and “deepwater drilling” as that which occurs in greater than 500 feet of water.

The moratorium was to last 30 days while Interior conducted a drilling safety review. On May, 28, 2010, the deepwater moratorium was expanded with great fanfare, and the shallow-water moratorium was quietly lifted without comment or explanation from Interior. Despite the announced 30-day safety review period, the Interior Department has produced any report or finding to justify its apparent conclusion that shallow-water drilling is safe.

Today it was revealed that Taylor Energy Company LLC’s shallow-water drilling operation, using Diamond Offshore’s Ocean Sarasota oil rig, has been leaking oil since at least April 30, 2010. That is just 10 days after the Deepwater Horizon explosion. Taylor Energy has multiple drilling operations in the Gulf of Mexico using the Ocean Sarasota, all in waters between 430 and 440 feet in depth.

“It is unbelievable and unacceptable for the Secretary of the Interior to lift the moratorium on shallow-water oil drilling right in the middle of a large shallow-water oil spill. If Ken Salazar did not know the oil spill had occurred, he is spectacularly incompetent. If he did know, he purposefully misled the public. Either way, he has utterly failed the American public and the Gulf of Mexico,” said Kierán Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity.

As it did BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling project, the Minerals Management Service, under Salazar’s watch, approved the Taylor Energy drilling project with an exemption from environmental review.

“To this day, the Department of the Interior is allowing the MMS to exempt drilling projects from environmental review,” said Suckling. “If the Taylor Energy disaster doesn’t force an immediate change of policy, we can only conclude that the Department of the Interior is as fully controlled by the oil industry as MMS itself."

More Information on the Dangers of Shallow-water Drilling

Contrary to the hand waving of the Interior Department, shallow-water drilling is very dangerous. Indeed, it has a worse blowout record than deepwater drilling.

1. The largest oil spill ever in North America – the Ixtoc 1 disaster – was from a well in just 160 feet of water in the Gulf of Mexico. The damaged rig spilled some 138 million gallons of oil into the Gulf over nine months in 1979 and 1980 before it was contained.

2. The largest oil spill globally in 2009 occurred in just 250 feet of water off the western coast of Australia. The Montara spill gushed oil for 10 weeks, making it Australia’s worst offshore-oil disaster.

3. A Mineral Management Service review of blowouts between 1992 and 2006 concluded that “most blowouts occurred during the drilling of wells in water depths of less than 500 ft.” The agency found one blowout per 362 wells drilled in 500 feet of water or less and just one blowout per 523 wells drilled in deeper waters. The same report also found that 56 percent of all blowouts — whether in deep or shallow waters — happened before the true vertical depth of the well bore depth reached 5,000 feet. The blowout in the Deepwater Horizon drill occurred at about 18,000 feet below sea level.

See MMS, 2007, “Absence of fatalities in blowouts encouraging in MMS study of OCS incidents 1992-2006.”

4. In May, 2010, Elmer Danenberger, a 38-year veteran of the Minerals Management Service, testified before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources that MMS data indicate “well control performance for deepwater drilling was significantly better than for shallow water operations.”

See Danenberger, 2010, “Congressional Testimony.”
Above link will take you to main page linking to testimony.
Article source>>>

Accidents bring calls to suspend shale drilling

Tuesday, June 08, 2010
By Don Hopey, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Serious accidents at Marcellus shale natural gas drilling operations in Pennsylvania and West Virginia over the past five days have prompted sanctions against one Texas-based drilling company, support for tighter federal regulations and even calls for a moratorium on drilling.
Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Secretary John Hanger on Monday ordered EOG Resources Inc., formerly Enron Oil & Gas Co., to suspend all new drilling operations in the state until an independent investigation of a massive well "blowout" Thursday night near Penfield, Clearfield County, is completed.
"The Clearfield County incident presented a serious threat to life and property," Mr. Hanger said. "We are working with the company to review its Pennsylvania drilling operations fully from beginning to end to ensure an incident of this nature does not happen again."
Mr. Hanger said it was fortunate that the well did not ignite or explode. A preliminary DEP investigation has determined that the well's blowout preventer failed, even though EOG records show the company inspected the device early Thursday morning.
The accident occurred when EOG's operators lost control of the well after fracturing, or cracking, the Marcellus formation more than a mile underground to release the natural gas locked in the shale. High pressure pushed the gas and "frack fluid" laced with toxic chemicals out of the well for 16 hours, spraying more than 35,000 gallons and maybe as many as 1 million gallons 75 feet into the air.
The DEP order prohibits EOG from drilling new wells for seven days, starting fracking activities for 14 days and initiating post-fracking operations for 30 days throughout the state. The investigation could extend those operational suspensions and result in additional fines or enforcement actions against the company. The order, which EOG agreed to, affects 50 drilled but incomplete wells in the state but not its 265 active wells.
EOG issued a press release in which Gary Smith, EOG vice president and general manager in Pittsburgh, said he "regrets the incident" and the company is cooperating with state investigators and conducting its own investigation.
Monday afternoon, EOG officials conducted a full briefing on the incident for members of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, a drilling industry advocacy group.
"It's important that the whole industry understands and can learn from those kinds of experiences and share what worked in emergency responses," said Kathryn Klaber, president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, who noted that the "blowout" in Clearfield County was the first in the Marcellus shale formation and such accidents are extremely rare.
But Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Rep. Joe Sestak on Monday called on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to increase its monitoring and oversight of Marcellus shale development, saying in a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson that adequate regulations are not in place to protect the public and water resources.
Until such regulations are in place, all Marcellus shale drilling operations should be halted because they pose an "immanent public health hazard," said Conrad Dan Volz, assistant professor for Environmental & Occupational Health at the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public Health and director of the school's Center for Healthy Environments and Communities.
Dr. Volz said the Clearfield "blowout" and a drilling rig explosion near Moundsville, W.Va., Monday that burned and injured seven drilling workers in a suspected methane gas explosion on a Chief Oil & Gas well is evidence that a moratorium is necessary to allow a thorough assessment of drilling operations and the risks they pose.
"This is a public health issue, especially for planned drilling in populated areas and around schools," he said. "It's an occupational health problem, an environmental health problem and an emergency preparedness problem that no one has foreseen."
But Ms. Klaber said that new federal regulation would be redundant to state laws, and a moratorium on drilling would drive up retail gas prices and deprive property owners of financial benefits from leasing gas drilling rights.
"These incidents occurred from two very different sets of circumstances," she said. "Having them happen so close together makes us look harder at the broader lessons learned and we are doing that right now."
The Marcellus shale formation underlies three-quarters of Pennsylvania and parts of New York, Maryland, Ohio and West Virginia, a total of 95,000 square miles, and contains as much as 363 trillion cubic feet of natural gas -- enough to supply the nation's gas demands for 10 to 15 years.
In Pennsylvania alone, approximately 2,500 Marcellus shale gas well drilling permits were issued from 2007 through 2009 by the state Department of Environmental Protection, which projects another 5,000 permits will be issued this year.
Don Hopey: dhopey@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1983.
Article source>>>

Las Vegas Optic, Letter: Secret deliberations cut into credibility

By Kate Daniel

I read, with disbelief, County Planning and Zoning Supervisor Alex Tafoya’s comment in your article, “(Task Force) Panel’s Makeup in Dispute.” He said, “....it’s not like we’re building a new nuclear bomb....”

Really? How would he characterize the impact to the Gulf of Mexico from the ongoing “natural disaster,” as the culpable British Petroleum calls it? I know that Mr. Tafoya’s remark was referencing the secrecy aspect of the task force and not the dangerous potential of this toxic industry, but the point he overlooked is that without proper regulation, the oil and gas industry is an extremely dangerous one for all concerned.

No one I know is advocating a drilling ban in San Miguel County. However, we deserve and expect any task force assembled and paid for with our tax dollars to consider our wellbeing above the convenience of the oil and gas industry. That they would even consider conducting their deliberations in secret is an affront to every San Miguel County citizen. Where is the advocate for the citizens who has equivalent firepower to Karin Foster’s position with the oil and gas industry?

Secret deliberations will completely undermine the credibility of any ordinance they propose. Allowing citizens to observe the proceedings will provide at least the illusion of transparency, even if the real negotiations are held in a back room somewhere.

Mr. Tafoya is right when he says that they’ll be criticized no matter what they do. This is the plight of every public figure. The only thing he and the rest of the task force need to determine is whether or not they have the wellbeing of the culture and general population of San Miguel County as their highest priority. If it is, they will write a good ordinance that protects what we have while adding oil and gas development into the mix. If not, they may as well just hand the keys to San Miguel County to the oil and gas industry and say goodbye to all that we hold dear in this community, because lightly regulated oil and has development will overwhelm the existing local economy and culture.

In doubt as to the economic and cultural effects of lightly regulated oil and gas development? Go visit Farmington and decide if this is what you want Las Vegas and San Miguel County to become.

Kate Daniel

Sapello

Las Vegas Optic Letter to the Editor: Let's prevent bomb with good process

By Pat Leahan
I am writing in response to a recent Optic article about the lop-sided membership of the San Miguel County Oil and Gas Ordinance Task Force.

Planning and Zoning supervisor Alex Tafoya was quoted as saying, in relation to the work of the task force, “It’s not like we’re creating a new nuclear bomb.” Mr. Tafoya is correct. We want an ordinance to prevent a bomb, not create one.

When I was a teenager, a natural gas pipeline exploded in our community. It was like a bomb was detonated. We lost two of our neighbors — a father running from the explosion with his child in his arms. They were killed by the fireball.

The video footage of the current environmental disaster unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico looks like a bomb in continuous-explosion-mode. And one of the options on the table to try and stop it is, ironically, a bomb. And the catastrophe itself is due, in large part, to weak regulations and lack of oversight (and greed, as well).

The job before our county task force is prevention and protection — an ordinance that provides oversight to prevent disasters, and includes strict regulations to protect our community.

We are not asking for much from our county commission — a balanced task force, transparency in the process of developing the ordinance, open meetings — you know, just the basics of fair and open government working with its citizens.

It’s not like we're asking them to create a new nuclear bomb.

Pat Leahan

Las Vegas

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Oil and gas drilling still going strong in New Mexico

There has been a lot of trash talking about the pit rule and its "negative" impacts on oil and gas development in New Mexico. I think the following press release from Governor Bill Richardson clearly shows that is not the case. So, protective regulations an economy killer, or simply conducive to human and environmental safety?



For Immediate Release Contact: Jodi McGinnis Porter
May 19, 2010
505.476.3226

Governor Bill Richardson Announces Oil and Gas Drilling Activity in New Mexico Is Strong
Environmental regulations are not driving business away
SANTA FE, NM - Governor Bill Richardson today announced that New Mexico's drilling activity has more than doubled this year according to the Baker Hughes rig count with 63 operating rigs reported on May 14, 2010, compared to 31 operating rigs a year ago on May 15, 2009. The number of oil- and gas-producing wells in New Mexico remains constant with new environmental regulations balancing our energy needs while protecting New Mexico's precious ground water and our environment.
"New Mexico's pit rules have shown that protecting our health and water resources are good for industry and the environment," said Governor Richardson. "The BP oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico is a sobering reminder that preventing environmental contamination is always less expensive than cleaning it up."
Activity in southeastern New Mexico's Permian Basin is especially strong. Apache Corporation, an independent energy exploration and production company, recently announced it expects to drill in excess of 200 new wells during 2010 in the Permian Basin. Of the 200-plus wells, 100 will be drilled in New Mexico, which will represent the most wells drilled by Apache in the state in any year.
"We can produce oil and gas in New Mexico in an environmentally sound manner that works for industry and protects our natural resources." said Jon Goldstein, Cabinet Secretary for the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department. "Drilling activity closely follows the price of oil and gas. As commodity prices rise, drilling activity increases."
The price of a barrel of oil was in the mid $30 range in 2009. Current prices in the $60-$70 range are driving healthy activity in New Mexico's southeastern oil fields. Unfortunately, natural gas prices have not increased to the same extent keeping activity at a lower level in the gas fields of the San Juan Basin.
The price of oil and gas fluctuates, but companies can find and produce oil and gas more safely, efficiently and with increased environmental protections using new technologies, such as directional drilling, reusing existing well pads for new wells and using closed loop systems to manage their waste.
Earlier this week, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar followed New Mexico's lead and announced that the Department of Interior's Bureau of Land Management is reforming its oil and gas program to improve environmental protection of important natural resources on U.S. public lands while aiding in the orderly leasing and balanced development of the nation's energy supply.
View press release index

Gulf of Mexico Oil Well Approved

While it is quite true that to err is human, if we do not learn from our mistakes, we really are doomed to repeat them.


By STEPHEN POWER
WASHINGTON - Federal regulators approved the first new Gulf of Mexico oil well since President Barack Obama lifted a ban on drilling in shallow water last week, angering environmentalists even as business groups urged his administration to relax a moratorium on new deepwater projects.

The Minerals Management Service said on its Web site Wednesday that it had granted a permit sought by Bandon Oil and Gas, LP to drill at a site about 50 miles off Louisiana's coast and about 115 feet beneath the water's surface.

Mr. Obama announced last week that the Interior Department would extend a moratorium on wells in more than 500 feet of water. At the same time, the administration said it would allow drilling projects to continue in less than 500 feet of water, provided they satisfy new safety and environmental requirements identified in a report that Interior Secretary Ken Salazar gave to Mr. Obama last week.

Environmental groups criticized the MMS, however, saying a 2007 study by MMS of all wells drilled between 1992 and 2006, found that most blowouts occurred in water less than 500 feet.

"This is like putting a drunk back in the driver's seat after handing him a cup of coffee," Mike Gravitz, a spokesman for Environment America, said.

At the same time, a group that represents the nation's offshore oil and gas operators said Wednesday that the administration's continuing moratorium on deepwater drilling warned will result in tens of thousands of job losses. The National Ocean Industries Association said the moratorium would halt work on 33 exploratory wells in the Gulf of Mexico.

"At a time when the spill is already causing economic stress for key industries in the region, the president's action will make things much worse by putting more Gulf citizens out of work," Burt Adams, the group's chairman, said.

An Interior spokeswoman didn't immediately respond to a request for a response to the industry group. In announcing details of the new restrictions this week, Mr. Salazar said they are a "prudent" step that will provide the government time to implement new safety requirements while a recently-appointed presidential commission investigates the cause of the April 20 Deepwater Horizon accident.

Write to Stephen Power at stephen.power@wsj.com
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U.S. Rep. Michael Burgess calls on Texas AG to investigate state's environmental agency

I have heard a lot of reassurances from oil and gas industry representatives. The most common is in regards to a lack of need for county-based regulations. This comes in the form of a statement like "there are already regulations and entities that enforce them, so why on earth would you want unnecessary regulations that will negatively impact business?" Well, I think the article below is a clear illustration of why counties need to take responsibility for their own well being.

11:57 PM CDT on Tuesday, June 1, 2010
By PEGGY HEINKEL-WOLFE / Denton Record-Chronicle
pheinkel-wolfe@dentonrc.com

U.S. Rep. Michael Burgess has called on the Texas attorney general to investigate the state's environmental agency, following an audit report that showed agency officials may have withheld information about toxic compounds found near natural-gas facilities.

"They have a credibility problem now," Burgess, R-Lewisville, said of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. "That's what's so disturbing. It calls into question virtually everything else they have done so far. You don't like to be treated dismissively."

Burgess had asked for a briefing on the TCEQ's air quality work, which the agency provided in late April. At the time, he wasn't as concerned about findings in Fort Worth as much as he was the Denton County findings, but no mention was made of the TCEQ audit. He said he was troubled that agency officials were sitting on the information.

The call for a full investigation could help restore confidence in the agency, Burgess said.

"We continue to work with both the public and elected officials to keep them informed of TCEQ's air quality activities in the Barnett Shale area," agency spokesman Terry Clawson said in a prepared statement.

The TCEQ audit followed a Feb. 3 complaint sent by e-mail to the agency's fraud division. According to the audit report, dated March 25, leadership in the TCEQ compliance division knew early on that, during a December air quality study of natural-gas facilities in Fort Worth, inspectors used equipment that was not sensitive enough to detect toxic compounds, including the carcinogen benzene, at long-term screening levels. More>>>

Panel's makeup in dispute

Luckily Drilling Santa Fe has been keeping up with the local news. Anyways, onwards with today's news.

Las Vegas Optic
31 May 2010
Headlines
Panel's makeup in dispute
By David Giuliani

Some are alleging that San Miguel County’s new task force on oil and gas regulations is heavily weighted toward the industry.

Of the 10 members, four of them have ties to oil and gas.

In April, the County Commission formed the panel to make recommendations for an ordinance that would deal specifically with oil and gas drilling. No requests for drilling are pending, but officials said they wanted to be prepared.

Both the county and the city of Las Vegas have enacted moratoriums on any drilling until they can enact new regulations.

For its task force, the county has divided the members into four groups — oil and gas industry, environmental and educational, citizens and county representatives.

The oil industry members consist of Karin Foster, an attorney with the Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico, and John Michael Richardson of the Petroleum and Mineral Land Services firm.

The environmental and educational members are Jeffrey Mills of the state Environment Department and Ken Bentson, a forestry professor at Highlands University.

The citizen members are general contractor J. David Blagg, retiree Ernesto Borunda and resident Larry Webb.

The county representatives are County Commissioner Nicolas Leger, County Manager Les Montoya and Planning and Zoning Supervisor Alex Tafoya.

Besides Foster and Richardson, both Webb and Mills are linked to the oil and gas industry.

In March, Webb urged the County Commission to do away with the moratorium. He said he had leases with companies for oil and gas drilling on the county’s east side. The moratorium, he said, was taking away his private property rights without just compensation.

He lists a Newkirk, N.M., address, which is in Guadalupe County. It’s not clear whether a citizen member can live outside San Miguel County.

Mills, an environmental member, said he is not on the task force as a representative of the Environment Department. Rather, he said he was there to provide his expertise because of his years of work in the oil and gas industry.

Mills acknowledged that he had discovered oil in the Gulf of Mexico and is a beneficiary of oil and gas royalties in Texas and Louisiana. He has worked for the Environment Department since 2001.

Mills praised the county for being “proactive” in its approach to possible oil and gas drilling. He said he is not affiliated with any oil and gas interests in New Mexico.

He said that when he wrote the county about his interest in a task force position, he focused on his experience in the industry, not as an employee of the Environment Department.

Pat Leahan of the Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center said she is concerned that the task force isn’t representative of science and community concerns.

“We can have industry people on the task force. But we need to have balance,” she said.

She said she and 13 others applied to belong to the task force and that none of them were pushing for a complete ban on drilling. More>>>

The City of Las Vegas [NM] passes moratorium

Yesterday, the Las Vegas City Council unanimously passed a two year moratorium on oil and gas development within city limits.

It's a gas for pols, lobbyists

'Tis the season for voting and it's also the season to ask, who is paying for all those shiny flyer's and television ads for political hopefuls?

Published: May 18, 2010 thetimes-tribune.com

On the theory that a modest tax on extraction of natural gas somehow could deter development of one of the world's largest natural gas fields, some Pennsylvania lawmakers have thwarted such a tax even as the industry rapidly has expanded.

Fortunately for the politicians, the folks who run the industry are not ingrates.

A new study by Common Cause of Pennsylvania, "Deep Drilling, Deep Pockets: The Campaign Contributions and Lobbying Expenditures of the Natural Gas Industry in Pennsylvania," tracks the rapidly growing amount of money that drillers have injected into the state's political landscape.

The report tracks campaign spending by industry figures back to 2002, when Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Fisher received $98,000 from industry sources and Ed Rendell received $10,000.

Compared with current contributions, that is pocket change. Republican gubernatorial candidate and current attorney general Tom Corbett has received more than $300,000 from industry sources since January 2008, while Democrat Dan Onorato has received nearly $60,000.

State law still bans corporate donations, so the money has been contributed by individuals. Christine Toretti, CEO of S.W. Jack Drilling of Indiana County, contributed $990,000 to candidates between 2001 and 2009, according to the report, about a third of the industry money donated. Terrance Pegula, founder of East Resources of Warrendale, and his wife, Kim, contributed more than $330,000 to candidates over the period.

Do you think the recipients answer their calls?

On the lobbying side the study goes back only to 2007, when Pennsylvania finally adopted a law requiring disclosure. Since then, the gas industry has spent more than $4.2 million lobbying Pennsylvania government officials, more than $715,000 in the first quarter of this year alone.

Do campaign contributions and lobbying affect policy? The industry must think so or it wouldn't spend so much money.

The study pointed out that when the state House recently passed a moratorium on further gas leases on state forest land, the 33 representatives who voted against it had received, on average, 3.4 times more campaign donations from industry sources than those who voted for the measure. That bill has not yet moved in the Senate.

Industry officials clearly believe that extensive lobbying and heavy campaign contributions are the cost of doing business. That is exactly what an extraction tax should be. The Legislature should adopt one with this year's budget.
Click here to visit article source.

Public News Service--Former Land Managers: Look at Onshore Drilling Safety, Too

May 17, 2010
CASPER, Wyo. - The Gulf of Mexico oil spill has led Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to announce there will be reforms on how leases are granted for offshore drilling. Meanwhile, 60 former land managers have sent him a letter about onshore drilling, asking him to finalize reforms he announced in January.

Gloria Flora formerly supervised the largest national forest in the Lower 48 states, the Humboldt-Toiyabe, where she dealt with what she saw as the destruction of natural resources. She signed onto the letter because she claims accidents happen almost everywhere there is production - with Wyoming having more issues than many other states in recent years.

"We've seen problems crop up continuously with onshore oil and gas drilling, and so you do wonder what it's going to take."

Mike Dombeck, former Chief of the U.S. Forest and director of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, also has signed the letter. His point is restoration of balance in all uses of public lands, instead of making development a priority.

"We should protect the health of the land that includes hunting and fishing and grazing and all the other uses, and have that be on an equal plane with oil and gas development."

Oil and gas companies say they take safety seriously; they accuse environmental groups of taking advantage of the Gulf accident to try to ban all domestic production.

The letter to Secretary Salazar does not call for a halt in drilling. It recommends a middle ground that allows development to continue, but be more tightly monitored.

Deb Courson, Public News Service - WY

Visit article source>>>

New York Times--Obama Vows End to ‘Cozy’ Oversight of Oil Industry

Promises sound really good...


By HELENE COOPER and JOHN M. BRODER
Published: May 14, 2010
WASHINGTON — President Obama angrily denounced the finger-pointing among the three companies involved in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill as a “ridiculous spectacle,” and vowed on Friday to end what he called the “cozy relationship” between the government and the oil industry that has existed for a decade or more.

In sharp remarks during an appearance in the Rose Garden, Mr. Obama announced a review of environmental safeguards for oil and gas exploration to prevent future spills. He said that he “will not tolerate any more finger-pointing or irresponsibility” from the industry or the government over who made the mess or how to fix it.

“This is a responsibility that all of us share,” Mr. Obama said. “The oil companies share it. The manufacturers of this equipment share it. The agencies and the federal government in charge of oversight share that responsibility.”

Mr. Obama said that he, too, feels the “anger and frustration” expressed by many Americans, and particularly by residents and business people in the gulf region.

“We know there’s a level of uncertainty,” Mr. Obama said, over just how much oil is gushing into the gulf from the undersea well that was left damaged and leaking by an explosion and fire that sank a drilling rig in April. He added that his administration’s response has always been “geared toward the possibility of a catastrophic event.” More>>>

New Mexico Independent--In oil and coal disasters, parallel tales of lax regulation

I'm an advocate for regulation and have been told many times that the oil and gas industry is regulated, so what's my problem. My problem is this: Not only are existing regulations insufficient, they are not properly enforced. All the regulations in the world aren't going to make a bit of difference if they are not enforced.

Laws intended to prevent recent tragedies went largely unenforced
By Mike Lillis 5/12/10 9:08 AM

On the surface, the two accidents couldn’t have been more different. The first occurred in the rugged mountains of Appalachia; the second was more than a thousand miles away in the Gulf of Mexico. One was miles underground; the other thousands of feet underwater. One happened in pursuit of coal; the other in the unending search for domestic oil.

Yet last month’s deadly explosion at the Upper Big Branch coal mine in southern West Virginia, and the more recent fatal blast on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig off the coast of Louisiana, have at least this much in common: Both were likely preventable, according to a growing number of lawmakers and workplace safety experts — if only federal regulations designed to prevent such disasters had been enforced.

“I don’t believe it is enough to label this catastrophic failure as an unpredictable and unforeseeable occurrence,” Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said during a Tuesday hearing on the Deepwater Horizon disaster. “If this is like other catastrophic failures of technological systems in modern history … we will likely discover that there was a cascade of failures: technical, human and regulatory.”

The message is clear: Regulations are only as good as the people enforcing them. And Congress, some experts are warning, would do well to recognize that trend as lawmakers contemplate reforms as diverse as those governing coal mines, oil rigs and Wall Street.

Along those lines, Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize winning economist for the New York Times, noted this week that the problems at the Interior Department are by no means unique. Instead, they represent “a broader pattern that includes the failure of banking regulation and the transformation of the Federal Emergency Management Agency … into a cruel joke.” The common thread, Krugman argued, “is the degradation of effective government by antigovernment ideology.”

Krugman targeted the Bush administration in particular. But many work safety experts are quick to note that the lax enforcement over the extraction industries represents a much broader trend, beginning well before Bush took office, and extending well beyond his exit. Along the way, federal enforcement agencies have been stacked, at times, with anti-regulation regulators — many of whom still remain. And the industries have showered millions of dollars on Congress in order to persuade lawmakers that, when it comes to protecting workers, business knows best. The results have been predictable.

“We have a strong anti-regulatory bent in this country,” said Celeste Monforton, former work-safety official in the Labor Department who’s now at George Washington University, “Regulation is like a four-letter word.” More>>>

Las Vegas Optic--City oil and gas moratorium urged

By David Giuliani

Oil and gas drilling just doesn’t occur in rural areas; it happens in cities, too.

As such, the City Council is considering passing a moratorium on such activity in the city limits. The county already did so a few months ago, so it could have time to draft a more detailed ordinance dealing with energy development.

Some New Mexico towns, including Carlsbad, Hobbs and Artesia, have oil and gas wells inside city limits. Seven years ago, a rig in Carlsbad had a blowout, causing the evacuation of part of that town.

Last week, the Las Vegas City Council held the first of two public hearings on whether to enact a moratorium.

Ten residents spoke for the proposed moratorium; no one spoke against it.

“This is an issue of greater importance than many may realize,” said Pat Leahan of the Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center. “Oil and gas drilling has, in fact, been done in municipalities and urban settings. Some of these hazardous wells are within 150 feet of people’s homes, in some cases without even the consent of those families.”

Mayor Alfonso Ortiz said the money generated from oil and gas drilling wouldn’t pay for the damages.

“We can’t be spoiling our environment. It’s not good for Las Vegas or San Miguel County,” the mayor said.

The City Council is expected to hold another hearing next month and then vote on the matter. There are no pending requests for oil and gas drilling before the city.

Commissioner [San Miguel County], state representative forums this week

As I have said before, oil and gas development is very much a political issue. It's important to keep up with the various candidates and know their positions because they have a tremendous impact on regulations.

Published in the Las Vegas Optic:

By Las Vegas Optic

Forums for San Miguel County Commission and state representative candidates are planned for Wednesday and Thursday.

The forum for candidates for the District 1 and 3 County Commission seats will be 6:30-8:30 p.m. Wednesday at Highlands University’s G35 (Leveo Sanchez Lecture Hall), which is next to Donnelly Library.

The forum for District 70 state representative hopefuls is Thursday, with the same hours and place.

The forums are sponsored by the Committee for the People and the Las Vegas Optic.

The candidates for the District 1 commission seat are incumbent June Garcia, Ron Ortega, Rock Ulibarri and Joe “Yunta” Lucero. For District 3 are incumbent Albert Padilla and Art Padilla. All are Democrats.

The Democratic state representative candidates are incumbent Richard Vigil, Barbara Perea Casey, Eric Michael Cummings and Chris Lopez.

The Democratic and Republican primaries are June 1.

For more information on the forums, call the Optic’s David Giuliani at 425-6796.

BP: Billionaire Polluter

BP has a really stellar operating record...In an imaginary universe where all oil companies are responsible and honest.

Posted on May 4, 2010
By Amy Goodman

Less than a week after British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon drilling platform exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and unleashing what could be the worst industrial environmental disaster in U.S. history, the company announced more than $6 billion in profits for the first quarter of 2010, more than doubling profits from the same period the year before. Oil industry analyst Antonia Juhasz notes: “BP is one of the most powerful corporations operating in the United States. Its 2009 revenues of $327 billion are enough to rank BP as the third-largest corporation in the country. It spends aggressively to influence U.S. policy and regulatory oversight.” The power and wealth that BP and other oil giants wield are almost without parallel in the world, and pose a threat to the lives of workers, to the environment and to our prospects for democracy.

Sixty years ago, BP was called the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. (AIOC). A popular, progressive, elected Iranian government had asked the AIOC, a largely British-owned monopoly, to share more of its profits from Iranian oil with the people of Iran. The AIOC refused, so Iran nationalized its oil industry. That didn’t sit well with the U.S., so the CIA organized a coup d’é tat against Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh. After he was deposed, the AIOC, renamed British Petroleum, got a large part of its monopoly back, and the Iranians got the brutal Shah of Iran imposed upon them, planting the seeds of the 1979 Iranian revolution, the subsequent hostage crisis and the political turmoil that besets Iran to this day.

In 2000, British Petroleum rebranded itself as BP, adopting a flowery green-and-yellow logo, and began besieging the U.S. public with an advertising campaign claiming it was moving “beyond petroleum.” BP’s aggressive growth, outrageous profit and track record of petroleum-related disasters paint a much different picture, however. In 2005, BP’s Texas City refinery exploded, killing 15 people and injuring 170. In 2006, a BP pipeline in Alaska leaked 200,000 gallons of crude oil, causing what the Environmental Protection Agency calls “the largest spill that ever occurred on the [Alaskan] North Slope.” BP was fined $60 million for the two disasters. Then, in 2009, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fined BP an additional $87 million for the refinery blast. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis said: “BP has allowed hundreds of potential hazards to continue unabated. ... Workplace safety is more than a slogan. It’s the law.” BP responded by formally contesting all of OSHA’s charges.

President Barack Obama said of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, “Let me be clear: BP is responsible for this leak; BP will be paying the bill.” Riki Ott is not so sure. She is a marine toxicologist and former “fisherma’am” from Alaska, and was one of the first people to respond to the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil disaster. Exxon deployed an army of lawyers to delay and defeat the legal claims of the people who were physically and/or financially harmed by the Valdez spill. “What we know is that the industry does everything it can to limit its liability,” she told me.

The (Mobile, Ala.) Press-Register reported that Alabama Attorney General Troy King told BP to “stop circulating settlement agreements among coastal Alabamians.” Apparently, BP was requiring owners of fishing boats seeking work mitigating the spill to waive any and all rights to sue BP in the future. Despite a BP spokesperson’s pledge that the waivers would not be enforced, the news report stated, “King said late Sunday that he was still concerned that people would lose their right to sue by accepting settlements from BP of up to $5,000.”

Even if BP doesn’t trick victims into signing away the right to sue, the 1990 Oil Pollution Act, while requiring polluters to pay the actual hard costs of the cleanup, caps the additional financial liability of a spill at just $75 million. Given that millions of people will be impacted by the spill, by the loss of fisheries and tourism, and by the cascade of impacts on related industries, $75 million is small change. More>>>