Commerce City Passes Moratorium On Fracking

December 20, 2011
CBS Denver

A sign at a fracking site outside Commerce City

(credit: CBS)

COMMERCE CITY, Colo. (CBS4) – There will no hydraulic fracturing in Commerce City for the next month. The Commerce City City Council voted unanimously for the freeze Monday night. It gives the council more time to discuss concerns about the practice of pumping water and chemicals into the ground to extract gas


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Colorado Approves Fracking Disclosure Rules

CBSDENVER4
December 13, 2011

(credit: CBS)

DENVER (AP) - Colorado will require energy companies to disclose the concentrations of all chemicals in hydraulic fracturing and also ask drillers to make public some information about ingredients considered trade secrets.

Colorado regulators unanimously approved the new rules Tuesday that take effect in April.
The guidelines are similar to those required by a first-in-the-nation law passed in Texas this year but go further by requiring the concentrations of chemicals to be disclosed.

“That’s the big advancer here. We’re getting a full picture of what’s in that fracking fluid,” said Michael Freeman, an attorney for Earthjustice who worked with industry to write the rules.

Also, if Colorado drillers claim a trade secret, they would still have to disclose the ingredient’s chemical family. In emergencies, companies would have to tell health care workers what those secret ingredients were.




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Fracking Concerns Worry Residents Targeted By Oil & Gas Production

CBS4
Paul Day
Oct 21 2011
AGATE, Colo. (CBS4) – Rick Blotter harvests late-season corn from his backyard organic garden. Nearby, a couple goats are tended by his wife Bev.

Where the couple lives — in the community of Agate in rural Elbert County — is surrounded by pristine ranchland. The Blotters are desperate to protect their retirement home from oil and gas production. National companies are already negotiating leases in the area.

“We’re just looking for good land that may be productive in the future,” says Kelsey Campbell, a spokeswoman for Chesapeake Energy.

Chesapeake — America’s No. 1 driller of natural gas — already has operations in Weld County. But it is among a growing number of oil and gas producers eyeing areas along the Front Range that have not traditionally been drilled, including Elbert County, Arapahoe County and Douglas County.

“I could imagine them leveling this out and putting a pad here,” he says.

VIDEO SERIES
Watch Environmental Specialist Paul Day’s video reports for this story below:

• Part I
• Part II
• Part III

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