Opinion

Cody should press BLM for better Peaks study

By David Dominick

This document was published online on Monday, October 06, 2008

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The business impacts of our national economic woes and locally smoky skies have created many challenges for the tourism trade in Cody Country.

Now, however, we are faced with perhaps our biggest threat to date - the spectre of the open high-desert country to the east transformed into an industrial zone.

Bill Barrett Corp. has staked several gas wells in the McCullough Peaks just east of Cody. They have started the process of drilling an exploratory well on state land and have applied for permits to drill on neighboring BLM sections.

This is but the camel's nose under the tent. The fault line they are targeting stretches from the McCullough Peaks southeast all the way to Worland, as shown in their 2007 Annual Report.

Energy exploration and development has exploded in the past 20 years. High energy prices have raised the bar on resource extraction, allowing companies to drill for natural gas in ways that were technologically and economically unfeasible just a few years ago.

The energy industry has long believed the Big Horn Basin contains gas reserves that can only be accessed via unconventional drilling techniques that differ radically from conventional development.

For example, in tight-sands gas plays, the gas is “locked up” up to 17,000 feet underground in sandstone formations that must be fractured to extract the resource. Not only do deep wells require much larger rigs than shallow plays, frac'ing requires many more chemicals, rigs and vehicles, and much more water and energy than conventional drilling. In addition, because production of a frac'ed well drops more than 50 percent in less than one year, new wells must constantly be drilled to maintain field production.

In the Rulison field in the Piceance Basin of Colorado (where Bill Barrett Corp. is drilling in the same rock formations they will be targeting in the McCullough Peaks) well spacing was originally 160 acres. It was decreased to 80 and then 20 and now is at 10-acre spacing. The impacts that result from this aggressive type of field development include the conversion of habitat and open space to well pads and dust, air pollution and noise from heavy truck traffic.

Two species threatened by this development are sage grouse and wild horses. Sage grouse cannot tolerate more than one well pad per square mile and require a healthy sagebrush community to thrive. Gov. Dave Freudenthal in August issued an executive order that stipulates measures must be undertaken to protect sage grouse.

At the very least, the Cody BLM office should apply the principles of this order to its current review of the Barrett application. The impacts associated with development also will severely disturb the life cycles of the wild horses that roam the McCullough Peaks.

The Cody BLM office grapples today with the corporation's applications and invites public comment on this project by Oct. 10. My impression from the scoping meeting is the BLM is not interested in performing an Environmental Impact Statement, as would be required if this were considered a “full-field” development.

Instead, the BLM is hoping to get away with a less-detailed analysis by claiming this is simply an “exploratory project.” Bill Barrett's 2006 annual report, however, shows plans to pursue intensive development in the Big Horn Basin. It's apparent the BLM simply does not have the required manpower or institutional will to perform adequate baseline studies before granting permission to drill.

If this development moves forward it will mean radical changes for Cody. For those familiar with the Jonah Field in Sublette County, this is a scary thought. What was once open space has been transformed into acre upon acre of well pads, pits filled with toxic chemicals and produced water, and the constant hum of industry.

Cody depends on tourism for its economic base; this is an undisputed fact. Think for a moment - will tourists want to travel through a gas field as they make their once-in-a-lifetime vacation to Yellowstone Park? Will people clamor to view wild horses and pronghorn through the brown smog of flared methane? Will Cody be the attractive destination it is today?

Now is the time to speak out and let the BLM know that we as a community value our wildlife and scenic resources. We know that domestic energy development is important. Certainly one cannot live in Wyoming without gaining at least a basic understanding of how our state is helping fuel the rest of the nation.

But Wyoming is doing enough. It will continue to do so, given geology and the industry-friendly climate of our state. Yet, we must protect our special places. We cannot drill every last scrap of earth in the name of energy.

It is imperative that we save some parts of Wyoming for future generations so they can experience a remnant of the great state we all love.

(David Dominick knows the McCullough Peaks from his experience running wild horses with the late Art Holman. In the 1950s he worked for a Carter Oil Co. seismograph crew that shot lines across the Big Horn Basin. He served as head of the federal water pollution program and authored the Clean Water Act of 1972 signed by President Nixon and served as the first Assistant Administrator of Hazardous Materials Control in the Environmental Protection Agency. He owns Dumbell Ranch in Meeteetse.)

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