Posted on 05/23/2018 9:43:14 AM PDT by gattaca
Trump Opens Door to Dangerous Fracking in Northern Arizona A new Trump administration plan proposes to auction off 4,200 acres of public land for oil and gas development in northern Arizona. The lands straddle the Little Colorado River, are within three miles of Petrified Forest National Park, and are near habitat for a federally threatened fish called the Little Colorado spinedace. Drilling and fracking would threaten to deplete and pollute groundwater in the Little Colorado River Basin.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is planning the September auction—which would convey development rights to fossil-fuel companies—without any site-specific public or environmental review, as required by federal law. Planning documents cite Trump policies that forego National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) analysis to fast-track fracking on public lands. According to BLM, about 90 percent of new oil and gas wells on public lands are fracked.
"This dangerous plan puts national parks, precious groundwater and wildlife in the crosshairs. We'll do everything we can to stop it," said Taylor McKinnon with the Center for Biological Diversity. "Fracking is a dirty, dangerous business that consumes enormous amounts of water and threatens wildlife and public health. Northern Arizonans won't tolerate public lands being sacrificed as gifts from Trump to the fossil fuel industry."
The BLM is using a shortcut to bypass the analysis of fracking's harm to the land and water that is required under NEPA. The sweeping "determinations of NEPA adequacy," or DNAs, presume that oil and gas development complies with the agency's 30-year-old resource management plan, which predates the U.S. fracking boom. The agency is also foregoing tribal consultations, stating that "tribal consultation was adequate for the [resource management plan]." By deferring all analysis until the drilling-permit stage—after industry has the right to develop the land—the bureau is unable to deny subsequent drilling plans.
"Fracking or drilling development could be catastrophic for the region's groundwater," said McKinnon. "This is Trump's energy dominance policy at work, where nothing matters except fossil-fuel interests."
Trump policies issued in January require the BLM to auction lands nominated by the fracking industry, skip site-specific environmental review and limit public input. BLM records show that since 2014 the fracking industry requested 145 parcels in northern Arizona for oil and gas leasing, most near the Hurricane Cliffs and Big Valley north of Grand Canyon National Park.
The Center for Biological Diversity has sued the BLM for using DNAs to plan oil and gas auctions in Ohio and Colorado...
The winning continues.
Ping.
So much BS in that article I don’t know where to start.
Wow! 4 thousand whole acres!! I’m gobsmacked.
Isn’t that about the size of Ted Turners driveway?
Ignoring Obama’s own EPA studies that say fracking has no bad effects on the environment and continuing the LIE.
Gotta say one thing for the lefites, they are consistent liars!
Too bad he couldn’t auction off most of UpState NY to stick to the Perfumed Price, Andrew...
MAGA drives the left wing elites even crazier!
Best election ever, continues each day with good news like this.
Thanks for posting.
I hope the Feds own some land in NY’s Southern Tier and allow fracking, cumo will blow his lid.
Little Colorado spinedace ,what the hell is that.Must be related to the Large Spandex.
Nevermind that the result of fracking is LESS carbon emissions by the US as coal burning power plants are replaced by cleaner natural gas.........
Who knows? At some point maybe this administration will even question the ethanol and biomass boondoggle in favor of better use of oil through additional breakthrough technology?
Drill Baby, Drill!
N.AZ and the San Pedro River area in SE AZ have uranium, I suspect this is the truth behind this, as well as the water wars with the feds in AZ.
This industry will not sit on its laurels, recovery rates are being pushed to double from where they are now and my guess is they will push after that as well. Yes, that other stuff can go bye-bye.
You ever seen some of these areas the Eco-freaks protest about? They are in the middle of NOWHERE! The water table is loaded with alkali, hydrogen sulfide, salt and is absolutely unusable and undrinkable.
.....now if we can only cheaper gas and fuel oil!
[[.....now if we can only cheaper gas and fuel oil!]]
Can’t- it’s ‘the summer season’ ya know? Gas is supposedly more expensive to make for summer fuel-
Funny- i don’t recall the 70’s 80’s and 90’s the price going up in the summers? back in the 80’s gas was around .60 cents a gallon or so and remained that price for years- fluctuating perhaps a couple of pennies in either direction- in just the last week or so our gasoline has gone from $2.80 to now $3.15
The environazi whack jobs essentially lie with every breath in their relentless assault on the energy business while they continue to be massive consumers of the product. Complete and total hypocrites.
“Look out the window, what do I see? Oil wells pumping more money for me...”
Handing this new technology to oilmen is not going to get them to stop. They have been opening up once “dry” wells for a while now, as recovery becomes ever more practical.
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