Colorado oil and gas regulators Wednesday sent Crestone Peak Resources back to the drawing board to look for a drill site farther away from homes and the Aurora Reservoir, with residents who opposed the company calling it a partial victory.
“While recognizing that important work still lies ahead, we look forward to collaborating on site locations that genuinely protect public health, safety, and welfare,” Randy Willard, a spokesperson for the grassroots Save the Aurora Reservoir, said in an email.
The group intervened in the permit proceedings, hiring a lawyer and expert witnesses to challenge the proposed State Sunlight-Long well pad, a site 3,188 feet from the closest home and 3,450 feet from the Aurora Reservoir.
Public meetings and hearings extended over several days in what Energy and Carbon Management commissioners called one of the biggest shows of community opposition in memory.
More than 300 people watched Wednesday’s hearing on Zoom.
In August, the ECMC approved a comprehensive drilling plan by Crestone, a subsidiary of Civitas Resources, to drill 166 wells on the state-owned Lowry Ranch. STAR also opposed the comprehensive plan.
Within that plan each individual drill site would also need ECMC approval. Even while green-lighting the comprehensive plan commissioners signaled that they were concerned about the proposed well pad closest to homes and the reservoir.
The Sunlight-Long pad, with 32 horizontal wells, is the largest in the plan and the one that drew reservations from commissioners.
The commission asked Crestone to do an alternative site analysis, but the two alternatives the company assessed could not reasonably be drilled.
“Crestone’s alternative location analysis brazenly suggested two alternative sites, both of which are much closer to that reservoir than is the proposed site,” Commissioner Brett Ackerman said.
“I believe this was an anemic and objectionable alternative location analysis,” Ackerman said. “The alternative location analysis is the commission’s primary and best tool to avoid adverse impacts.”
Commissioner John Messner said “what was provided was superficial and missed the mark.”
On a 4-1 vote, ECMC stayed Crestone’s application for the Sunlight-Long oil and gas development plan, which has been pending for more than a year, and asked for revised alternative site analysis.
Crestone must look for sites farther from homes
The commission urged the oil and gas operator to look for a site farther east, away from homes, to consider doing two drilling pads instead of one, and discussing with Arapahoe County any variances that might be needed for alternate sites.
Commissioners also encouraged the company to engage with the community to discuss siting.
Crestone was also asked to evaluate the trade-off of sites where it might not be possible to access all the oil and gas but which might be more protective. The general principle in regulation is to capture all the minerals and avoid waste.
“This gets to the definition of waste, and the fact that at times waste is not nondevelopment of the resources if it’s necessary for protection of public health, safety, welfare, the environment and wildlife resources,” ECMC Chairperson Jeff Robbins said.
Richard Cahill, a spokesperson for Civitas Resources, said in an email that “the plan is undoubtedly the most vetted site in the state, if not the country.”
“While the decision was postponed, we have direction on re-submitting clarifying information that will garner support from a majority of the ECMC commissioners,” Cahill said.
STAR’s Willard said “it will take time to assess alternative locations, cumulative impacts and to complete the necessary engineering. Throughout this process, STAR remains ready to partner with industry and the ECMC.”
Commissioner Michael Cross was the dissenting vote, saying Crestone had met all the statutory requirements and had gone even further adopting best management practice called for by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
Among these steps were using electric drilling rigs, which are quieter and nonpolluting, using low-emission engines, pipelines to carry away oil, water and gas to cut down on truck traffic and reducing the amount of equipment onsite.
Robbins noted that CDPHE, Colorado Parks and Wildlife, Aurora Water, Arapahoe County and the Colorado State Land Board, which issues the lease to Crestone, all signed off on the plan.
“Trying to say this is not protective merely because a great number of people are opposed to it is inconsistent with what our legislative mandate is and what our rules require,” Cross said.