Posted on 05/24/2014 11:07:55 AM PDT by Hojczyk
Oil companies say a weeks-old Obama administration ruling that protects a Southwestern prairie bird has already halted oil-drilling operations in Kansas and is costing the U.S. economy tens of millions of dollars, as a GOP congressmen suggests the move is another “job-killing” attack on fossil fuel.
The decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that was announced in late March and took effect May 1 includes a provision that should allow federal officials and landowners in the five impacted states -- Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas -- to manage conservation efforts.
But oil producers say the interim weeks was too little time for them to digest the regulations and figure out how to avoid the potential criminal and civil penalties.
“Not complying brings very stiff penalties, so we’ve basically just pulled out of western Kansas,” Mike Vess, owner of Wichita-based Vess Oil Corp., said earlier this week. “The reaction was ‘OK, we’re just not going to drill.’”
Vess told FoxNews.com that his company is established enough to survive, but smaller ones might not and hourly workers and subcontracts such as geologists and water haulers will be hit hard.
He is asking federal officials to suspend the enforcement of the new regulations for six months so both sides can talk about best practices and “find a way for companies to co-exist with the lesser prairie chicken.”
The reaction across southwest Kansas and in the four other states to putting the bird on the federal protected list has essential been the same. And it follows warnings that the decision would result in the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in oil and gas development in one of the country's most prolific regions, the Permian Basin in Texas and New Mexico.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
But!...They have no problem with their windmills anihilating thousands of birds listed as protected species...starting with the bald eagle.
And the hipocrisy lives on...
Pretty soon this statement: “Hi, I am here from the Federal Government to help you,” will draw gun fire.
And we wonder why there are no jobs….This crap killed the logging industry…will it ever end….I think Nixon sighed this bill…
more Bats , Rats and Crows coming to a state with oil SOON
The lesser prairie chicken habitat is much more adversely impacted by wind turbines than it is by drilling for oil, but wind turbines are politically fashionable and the people cashing in on it have bought and paid for the Obama Administration.
Every agency needs to be stripped of the ability to regulate, (i.e., pass laws) period.
Laws should only be passed by congress so they are held accountable. This isn’t rocket science, it’s common sense.
The conservation groups have become even more useless than the used to be, considering they don't think its important to save eagles from death by windmill.
“Looking around the room I noticed that there were not many empty seats. Attending were just a couple of ranchers. The seats were filled with a small horde of federal and state employees, some NGO’s, a few mineral people and a slew of consultants. From the discussion I don’t think it will be long before the mineral industry will be forced to plant sagebrush on all reclaimed sites. The University folks are working on everything to do with sage grouse from the practical to the obscure. The lowly sage grouse has now become an industry.” Doug Cooper, April 9, 2014
http://www.tsln.com/news/opinion/10878552-113/grouse-sage-private-blm
Here’s Cooper’s story; his stewardship was his downfall.
“...core areas trace economic or even political as well as biological boundaries, while individual landowners — those who’ve protected sage grouse and their habitat so far and ended up inside the core areas — are asked to make development sacrifices.”
http://wyofile.com/emilene_ostlind/wyomings-sage-grouse-strategy-sets-bar-for-rest-of-the-west/
and (pdf, can’t copy text but a good read)
http://www.rangemagazine.com/features/spring-14/range-sp14-sacrificial_lambs.pdf
they got wings... right??? let fly elsewhere
But yet it is acceptable to kill countless EAGLES.
Liberalism IS a mental disorder.
Not only is this B.S. but Kansas is actually shipping Prairie Chickens to Illinois to help repopulate theirs. Notice that Illinois is not on this list.
FR: Never Accept the Premise of Your Opponent’s Argument
With the exception of the federal entities indicated in the Constitution's 16 & 17 of Section 8 of Article I as examples, entities under the exclusive legislative control of Congress, the states have never delegated to the feds, via the Constitution, the specific power to define or protect endangered animal species.
As a side note concerning bona-fide federal laws which address wildlife, laws reasonably based on the Constitution's Commerce Clause, Clause 3 of Section 8 of Article I, Congress made the Lacey Act of 1900 to address interstate wildlife poaching problems.
Lacy Act of 1900
I’ve thought that the administration has already done its worst by the oil industry. But I could be wrong.
Another agency that should be divided up and handed off to the states... for them to either fund or disband as they see fit.
The marketplace is very competitive and the margins on commodities is very low. We need to get the red tape out of the way and fast. I cannot wait until Congress crosses over back to normalcy.
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