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Study Will Determine Western Energy Policy
For Immediate Release: Contacts: LARAMIE, WY--Environmental groups have pointed to a Department of Energy study as proof that environmental protections are no obstacle to oil and gas production. The study, known as the Environmental Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) Report, acknowledges that 85% of oil and 88% of natural gas in the five basins is currently available for leasing, when environmental restrictions are taken into account. In Wyoming, the figures are even higher: 88% of the technically recoverable oil and 90% of the gas are available in the Green River Basin (including the Red Desert), while 96% of the oil and 91% of the gas is available for leasing in the Powder River Basin. "The oil industry's complaints that environmental restrictions are blocking their access to oil and gas are clearly unfounded," says Erik Molvar of Biodiversity Conservation Alliance. "There is no need to gut our environmental laws, or open up our most sensitive public lands in the Red Desert and the Bridger-Teton."
Oil and gas development is only one of many economic components of public lands use; competing non-industrial uses of public lands make a major contribution to the Wyoming economy. According to a study by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, combined total expenditures by hunters, anglers and trappers in Wyoming totaled nearly $1 billion in 2000. In 2001 the Wyoming travel and tourism industry brought in $1.82 billion. Throughout the West, the travel and recreation industry brings in $17 billion a year. "The Administration should know that wildlife protection, hunting, fishing and recreation are a cornerstone of the West's economy, not just 'impediments' to oil and gas development as the energy industry claims," according to Mac Blewer of the Wyoming Outdoor Council.
Special stipulations governing oil and gas production protect wildlife, scenery, and other multiple-use values important to the public. "Our public lands are supposed to be managed for multiple use and the public benefit, for clean air, clean water, and healthy wildlife, not just for quick profits for the oil and gas industry," says Molvar.
Seasonal stipulations to protect winter range, long reviled as impediments by the oil and gas industry, only forbid drilling during the winter season. "These stipulations are only minor inconveniences to the oil and gas industry that don't significantly impact fossil fuel production, because most allow drilling for 6-9 months out of the year, and allow production year-round" said Blewer.
"Wildlife and wildlands are important to my job and my quality of life," states Dubois outfitter and hunter Tory Taylor. "While I understand that there will be some development, we don't need development that jeopardizes Wyoming's wildlife and our last wild places. We don't need to sacrifice everything. When we talk about the energy industry, it's a one shot deal. In a hundred years what are we going to have left? Wildlife and wild places are sustainable resources that we should take care of for future generations."
Current environmental protections are proving insufficient to protect wildlife and landscapes in hard-hit areas like the Powder River Basin. Dale Ackles, an avid hunter in the Powder River Basin, says, "Destroy the best habitat on eight million acres and deny its use to 150,000 mule deer, and you have some idea of the potential impact of uncontrolled coalbed methane development in northern Wyoming."
The report does overestimate the amount oil and gas available by focusing on 'technically recoverable' resources, the oil and gas that could be extracted if production costs were no object. "But realistically," says Dr. Peter Morton, an economist for the Wilderness Society, "the report should be highlighting the economically recoverable reserves for the basins in question, because this provides an honest assessment of the amount of gas and oil that can be produced with current technology and economic realities. At most, only 20% of the oil and gas in the Rockies is actually economically recoverable."
Focusing on technically recoverable oil and gas is a mistake that has led to economic disasters in the past. In western Colorado, for example, speculation based on predictions of 200 years of technically recoverable oil shale led to the "Black Sunday" collapse in the late 1970s. When it turned out that processing the oil shale was cost-prohibitive, 2,200 workers lost their jobs, and Mesa County is still $35 million in debt from bonds issues on speculation of future oil revenues. "It's not fair to communities to project job gains or tax revenues based on technically recoverable oil and gas," says Dr. Morton. "More study is needed to determine how much oil and gas can be recovered economically before the EPCA study can be applied to land management plans."
The report estimated that 3.9 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil and 138.5 trillion cubic feet of gas underlie federal lands in the major Rocky Mountain deposits. Using the Department of Energy figures on current energy usage, the EPCA study's findings indicate federal lands in the Rockies could satisfy the nation's gas demands for no more than 6.1 years, and only 198 days for oil, even if all of known and undiscovered resources could be extracted. "Drilling the Intermountain West to death won't do much to ease this nation's dependence on foreign oil," says Molvar. "The Administration should take a long, hard look at developing renewable energy sources before the fossil fuels run out."
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Biodiversity Conservation Alliance P.O. Box 1512, Laramie, WY 82073 (307) 742-7978 - maggie@voiceforthewild.org |
