Clean Water Action delivers 1,000 hand-signed postcards to Governor Hickenlooper

For Immediate Release
September 26, 2012
Clean Water Action, Gary Wockner, 970-218-8310

Clean Water Action delivers 1,000 hand-signed postcards from Denver metro residents asking Governor Hickenlooper to increase drilling/fracking setbacks.

Denver, CO – On Wednesday September 26^th, Clean Water Action delivered 1,000 postcards to the Office of the Governor that were hand-signed by residents in the Denver metro area urging Governor Hickenlooper to take action and support a significant increase in the distance drilling and fracking sites can be from homes, schools, and hospitals. Clean Water Action’s canvassing program has been knocking on doors throughout the metro area over the last 6 weeks, educating citizens at the door and helping them take action.

“Current setback standards of 350 feet in densely populated areas are not far enough to protect our air, water, and communities,” said Gary Wockner of Clean Water Action.  “The public’s health and property values are increasingly at risk as drilling encroaches on suburban Colorado.”

The Colorado School of Public Health published a study indicating that cancer causing air emissions from drill sites may cause health impacts up to a half mile from a drill site, which is a 7.5 times greater distance than current Colorado setbacks law requires. 

The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) has convened a “Setback Stakeholder Group” made up of local governments, environmental groups, individuals, and COGCC staff.  

“We want to see some real leadership from Governor Hickenlooper on this issue,” said Gary Wockner. “Coloradans deserve to have their community’s health, property values, quality of life, and safety protected when a new rulemaking process moves forward about setbacks.”

Photo: http://water.clean.home.comcast.net/~water.clean/CWA-deliver-postcard-to-hick.jpg

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Activists: Mysterious land scars may be caused by oil/gas waste

By Jefferson Dodge

They kind of look like alien-made crop circles, but the jury is still out on whether mysterious linear shapes in Weld County are the work of frackers or ranchers feeding their cattle.

Colorado activists have raised concerns about satellite imagery of what appears to be scarred earth caused by the dumping of oil/gas drilling waste, but state officials maintain that most of the strange patterns are simply areas where livestock feed was deposited.

Shane Davis, chair of the Poudre Canyon Group of the Sierra Club, and Gary Wockner, Colorado program director of Clean Water Action, submitted the aerial photos to Gov. John Hickenlooper on March 5.

In an accompanying letter, Davis and Wockner wrote that the images seem to support rumors that have been circulating about the illegal disposal of drilling and hydraulic fracturing (fracking) fluids and other wastes.

“These images appear to support the rumored allegations and may suggest that drillers and frackers may have been driving tanker trucks off-road, opening the valve on the tanks while driving, and spraying drilling and fracking fluids and wastes across the landscape,” they wrote. “The images suggest that the chemicals sprayed out may have killed the vegetation on the landscape — green areas are turned orange/brown or completely white. Two-track wheel tracks can be seen trailing some of the alleged possible dumping sites.”

Davis and Wockner asked Hickenlooper to direct state officials to investigate, which they did over the following 11 weeks. Davis says the state requested two extensions due to the difficulty of the research involved.

In a May 22 letter, Thomas Kerr, acting director of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC), dismissed the claims.

According to Kerr’s letter, COGCC staff examined aerial photos and conducted on-site inspections at a “subset” of the locations in question on May 5 and May 10. The state’s investigation appears to focus solely on the Guttersen Ranch, where Kerr said “many” of the wells identified by Davis and Wockner are located.

The Guttersen Ranch is an active cattle ranch that also has numerous oil and gas wells, and the fenced property is strictly monitored to prevent dumping and trash disposal, Kerr wrote. He attributed the strange land scars to two things: the permissible spread of drilling mud and the feeding of cattle.

When advised of Davis’ continuing doubts about the explanation offered for the strange lines, Guttersen said, “I don’t give a shit about the guy, to be honest with you.”

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