Uintah drilling agreement could worsen basin's ozone problem

EXCERPT:
"The Bureau of Land Management will allow a major natural gas drilling project in northeast Utah to proceed despite the fact that emissions from thousands of new gas wells could exacerbate wintertime air pollution in the state's Uintah Basin.

Under a much-touted agreement rolled out last week, Houston-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp., will be allowed to drill up to 3,675 new natural gas wells inside a nearly 163,000-acre section of BLM land. In addition to the new wells, the project calls for the construction of 760 miles of new roads, 1,400 miles of buried and surface pipelines and seven miles of electrical power lines."

COMMENT:
Is there any confusion that the environment, people and wild animals are held hostage by the oil industries?  Do you have the power in this country to say "no" to this egregious industrial impact?  Do you have the power to refuse this industrial pollution in your community that is contributing to global warming, rising asthma rates and failing health in our children?  What power do you have?  Perhaps a "People and Ecosystem Movement" that constitutes a revolution to take back our rights to clean air, clean water, our health and safety.  What is there to lose?




Scott Streater
June 16, 2011
The Bureau of Land Management will allow a major natural gas drilling project in northeast Utah to proceed despite the fact that emissions from thousands of new gas wells could exacerbate wintertime air pollution in the state's Uintah Basin.

Under a much-touted agreement rolled out last week, Houston-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp., will be allowed to drill up to 3,675 new natural gas wells inside a nearly 163,000-acre section of BLM land. In addition to the new wells, the project calls for the construction of 760 miles of new roads, 1,400 miles of buried and surface pipelines and seven miles of electrical power lines.

In exchange for permits to build the Greater Natural Buttes Area Gas Development Project, Anadarko subsidiary Kerr-McGee Oil & Gas Onshore LP has committed to a number of pollution reduction strategies designed to significantly reduce its impact to regional air quality.

The terms of the agreement, which BLM developed alongside U.S. EPA, are outlined in a supplement to a draft environmental impact statement (EIS) on the drilling project released last year. The deal is open for public comment through June 25, and is expected to be incorporated into a final EIS later this year.

But the agreement represents more than a single bold stroke for one company seeking to expand its footprint in an environmentally sensitive landscape like the Uintah Basin....continued....