Can we purchase a preferred alternative

[mtmiller]

This is from last week, but thought a few might enjoy it.

Encana offers money up front

By WHITNEY ROYSTER
Star-Tribune environmental reporter
In an effort it says shows its commitment to wildlife habitat work, EnCana Oil and Gas Inc. agreed to transfer $1.1 million to the state for off-site mitigation around the Jonah Field.

The money will be transferred to the state's new Wildlife and Natural Resources Trust Account Board, which will hold the funds. It has not been transferred yet, as the state needs to work out an agreement with the Bureau of Land Management, which will likely oversee and administer off-site mitigation work.

Robin Smith, a consultant for EnCana, said the company elected to transfer the money before any decision has been made regarding well development on the Jonah Field "as a part of its show of commitment to fund up to $28 million for off-site mitigation and monitoring" in connection with the Jonah drilling project.

But there is a catch. The $1.1 million will remain with the wildlife trust only if the BLM authorizes a drilling project allowing at least 8,300 acres of surface disturbance in the 31,000-acre field. That amount of disturbance is proposed in the BLM's preferred alternative for the Jonah Infill Drilling Project. The operator's preferred alternative would allow surface disturbance to about twice that.

If an alternative is chosen that allows less than 8,300 acres of disturbance, the money will be given back to EnCana.

A BLM decision is expected in January.

Steven Hall, a spokesman for Wyoming's BLM, said any decision by EnCana to transfer money early will "not unduly influence" the BLM's final decision.

"EnCana has a right to make whatever proposals it wants," Hall said. "It will not supersede the BLM's decision."

He said it is "commendable" that EnCana is proposing to mitigate impacts to Jonah drilling. Any off-site mitigation money is voluntary now, but becomes mandatory once an application is accepted.

Smith, too, said the money is not intended to influence the BLM's decision.

He said the amount of off-site mitigation money comes from looking at acres of surface disturbance within the Jonah Field. If the company is limited to less than 8,300 acres of disturbance, on-site mitigation is occurring at an expense to EnCana. Therefore, dollars available for off-site work are not available and may not be as necessary.

EnCana has pledged up to $5.5 million in off-site mitigation money if the BLM's preferred alternative is chosen and $28 million if its preferred plan is chosen.

Environmental reporter Whitney Royster can be reached at (307) 734-0260 or at [email protected].

A new Jonah office

As the state moves to accept EnCana Oil and Gas Inc.'s $1.1 million in off-site mitigation money, a Jonah Interagency Mitigation and Reclamation Office is also being established to oversee monitoring on the Jonah natural gas field.

The office will be funded by EnCana to the tune of about $600,000 per year, and will staff people from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, Bureau of Land Management, Department of Environmental Quality and Department of Agriculture.

This group will examine projects for off-site mitigation work for the Jonah Field. The group will review the projects and make recommendations to the BLM, which will ultimately oversee and implement the projects.

According to Robin Smith, an EnCana consultant, the hope is anyone -- such as Trout Unlimited, the governor's office, Game and Fish or the general public -- will be able to suggest projects.

Final structure of the mitigation and reclamation office is expected in the next three weeks.

 

[Oak]

Miller, I was going to post this a few days ago, but didn't. Hey, what's a little extortion among friends, right?

I believe EnCana's preferred alternative (which would earn the $28 million) is for over 16,000 acres of surface disturbance!

Oak

 

[Tom]

Just who is being extorted, when they offer to pay some BLM people between $1 million and $28 million?

"According to Robin Smith, an EnCana consultant, the hope is anyone -- such as Trout Unlimited, the governor's office, Game and Fish or the general public -- will be able to suggest projects."

What project would you suggest?

 

[Oak]

Tom, do you think the company should try to buy their preferred alternative? Or maybe the BLM should REQUIRE them to pay the $28 million for the BLM's preferred alternative. Since when do the energy companies get to make the rules?

Oak

 

[Tom]

They don't get to make the rules. The BLM said their decision would not be influenced by the offer. I'm glad the company is trying to make a solution and I hope whatever happens, its good.

What projects are there to do from $1 million to $28 million? Any idea, the article didn't seem to say.

 

[BuzzH]

Tom,

Please, tell me you arent really buying Encanas steaming load of crap...

I know you're smarter than that.

The alternative that I would propose is to tell EnCana to take their chicken shit bribe and shove it up their greedy asses...

Tom, these people DO NOT work on behalf of wildlife, the American public, or anyones best interest but their own. If it was up to them, they'd kill the last deer, elk, or whatever animal that got in their way of "their" oil, gas, and PROFIT MARGIN...and that is a FACT.

You can trust the greedy bastards all you want...but personally, I wouldnt walk across the street to piss on them or their bribe if they were both on fire.

 

[1_pointer]

I haven't seen this one. Pretty damn scarey. This could set a precedence that brings up many a 'conflicts of interest' questions for me. If this was a grazing decision I can only imagine how fast it would end up in court!

 

[Oak]

This is the original article I saw on this story.
*********************************************************************************

Industry walks a fuzzy line between preservation and extortion
by Whitney Royster
August 8, 2005

Gas company offers millions for permission to maximize drilling

Last year, natural gas companies extracted a lot of gas from the sagebrush country around Pinedale, Wyo. — about $3 billion worth.

The drilling continues at a fast pace. But energy companies, government agencies and environmentalists are struggling over a key issue: how to extract the gas while protecting a spectacular wildlife community that includes sage grouse and tens of thousands of pronghorn.

Now, one energy company has made an unusual proposal. EnCana Oil and Gas USA Inc., which pulled about $600 million worth of natural gas from local fields last year, says it is willing to pay to improve wildlife habitat in areas around Pinedale where it isn’t drilling. The company would spend up to $21.85 million over the next decade, for measures such as habitat studies and the restoration or preservation of up to 70,000 acres of land.

There’s a catch, however: In return for its money, EnCana wants permission to carry out one of the most intensive drilling proposals in the West, damaging much of the remaining habitat in the 30,500-acre Jonah Field.

The proposal shows that "EnCana is committed to developing the Jonah Field at a net positive impact to the environment," says Jeff Johnson, a project leader for the company.

But critics say the company just wants to buy its way out of regulations that call for preserving habitat in gas fields. Peter Aengst, in the Northern Rockies office of The Wilderness Society in Bozeman, Mont., says the offer is "almost extortion."

Better than perfume on a pig

The Jonah Field, which lies about 30 miles south of Pinedale, contains an estimated 13.7 trillion cubic feet of gas, worth more than $5 billion at today’s prices. EnCana and a few other companies have already drilled about 600 wells in the field. EnCana has proposed another 3,100 wells to be drilled over the next 12 years, two-thirds of them by the company itself. To extract as much gas as possible, wells would be spaced an average of 10 acres apart; some would be as close as every five acres. The drilling would result in "surface disturbance" on at least 16,200 acres.

The company developed its proposal in more than a year of talks with state officials and the federal Bureau of Land Management, which controls most of the land and mineral rights in the Jonah Field. The Bush administration has encouraged the BLM to consider such "offsite mitigation" proposals, says Don Simpson, a deputy state director of the BLM.

The BLM released a draft environmental impact statement in February, listing nine alternatives for public comment. While some of them call for hundreds fewer wells than EnCana proposes, the BLM’s "preferred alternative" would allow the 3,100 new wells.

The preferred alternative doesn’t give EnCana everything it wants, though. To protect grouse nests, the agency effectively recommends 40-acre well spacing in half of the field. That would require the use of "directional drilling" — diagonal wells — from existing well pads, a process EnCana says would cost more, while extracting less gas. EnCana says that if it has to use directional drilling, it will pay only $1.4 million for habitat mitigation, enough to preserve up to 4,000 acres.

The preferred alternative would allow up to 11,000 acres of surface disturbance. Simpson says habitat would be improved near the Jonah Field to provide a "safe harbor" for wildlife. Once the drilling tapers off, he says, some of the damaged habitat within the field would be rehabilitated, and wildlife would eventually return.

But Gov. Dave Freudenthal, D, says the habitat in the Jonah Field has already been "debilitated," and that more drilling will consume what’s left. The BLM’s preferred alternative, he says, amounts to "a futile attempt to ‘perfume the pig.’ " Instead, he supports EnCana’s proposal for maximum development in the field, combined with the highest amount of offsite mitigation.

And the Wyoming Department of Game and Fish wants to combine the best aspects of both the BLM’s and EnCana’s proposals — the maximum amount of offsite mitigation, together with an attempt to preserve some habitat in the field.

No quid pro quo

Environmentalists are "conflicted" about EnCana’s offer, according to Aengst. The Jonah Field "is already pretty trashed," but it’s difficult to evaluate EnCana’s offer because it lacks specifics, he says. He would like to see EnCana commit to preserving land in key migration corridors for pronghorn and deer.

Offsite mitigation is worth considering, says Gwen Lachelt, director of the Oil and Gas Accountability Project, an industry watchdog based in Durango, Colo. But, she adds, "It should never be used as an excuse for not utilizing best practices and preventing and reducing impact at the well site."

Erik Molvar, a biologist who heads the Laramie-based Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, says his group may sue the BLM if it allows any new well pads in the Jonah Field. "EnCana is basically trying to produce as much gas as it can, as cheaply as it can," he says, while other companies in the area do expensive directional drilling, disturbing less land per well.

Environmentalists are also worried that the "extortion component" will set a precedent for other companies, Aengst says. The offsite mitigation money, he says, "should be mandatory, and completely divorced from some sort of quid pro quo of ‘We get what we want.’ You don’t get to buy what you want in an (environmental impact statement)." The public comment period on the project ended in April; the BLM says it will analyze the comments and reach a final decision later this year.

 

[Tom]

We have drug company bribes, sort of, from one point of view in biomedical research. Its often up to us in the medical schools to make sure their profit motive doesn't overcome good medical practice with sound and proven treatments.

That's why I asked you guys what kind of projects there would be to do with the money. You should be taking their money and putting it to good use, but nobody wants to name a project, not one, so far. What good is the BLM? They soak up federal dollars, piss on private dollars, and nobody has a good idea, yet on how to make this work.

I hope they figure something out good, all of them extortionists. We don't have BLM public meetings around here, so I'm just viewing it from afar, Buzz. At this point, I don't buy anybody's view on this stuff. I'm from the land of private management, 2% public land here. Two different sets of problems, for sure, private versus public.

 

[mtmiller]

You should be taking their money and putting it to good use, but nobody wants to name a project, not one, so far.

Apparently that is your opinion. Are you saying that government agencies are not using $$$ for projects? Where do you get this stuff?

 

[Tom]

No one in the article or here, seems to want to put the $1 to $28 million to good use.
The BLM said they will not be influenced by the dollars, the others here call it a bribe. Only the energy company seems to want it to be put to good use, at this point. That's where I got it from, right here in this thread.

Do you have any data on the total BLM and National Forest Service budget and income? I've read some of that, it costs a lot and brings a little in, basically.

 

[BuzzH]

Hey Tom,

Why do you think nobody wants to take the extortion money?

Apparently you just dont get it.

 

[Tom]

I don't know why, I hope they can tell us and make sense and I hope you guys post it when they do. Maybe they'll get more money some other way, is that it? Apparently, they don't know what they want to do yet, that's why, if I had to say.

 

[noharleyyet]

Buzz, I'm guessing they (the state) would love to take the money but with far fewer stipulations.

I agree with the dangerous precedent statement. Big oil is just as ruthless and savvy as they are allowed to be.

 

[1_pointer]

By taking an incentive based on the incentive along, the agency loses all objectivity. They have more than one resource and point of view to take into consideration.

That money could go a long way to getting some good projects in, but is the cost of the oil/gas extraction worth it?? Not my decision.

 

[Tom]

"EnCana is committed to developing the Jonah Field at a net positive impact to the environment," says Jeff Johnson, a project leader for the company.

That's something to hold them too, eh. They expect billons of dollars of gas, wow.

I wonder if we all put our furnace on 60 for the winter and just wore a sweater, not bad, how much energy that would save? 60 is actually pretty nice, in a way. Here, I'd have to keep my AC off to save though. haha I do that a lot, I'm home so rarely the last few years.