Posted: Friday, June 6, 2008 12:00 am
CHEYENNE - The five elected officials who sit on the Wyoming Board of Land Commissioners are faced with a decision on a project that could generate $24 million per year for the state's school trust but also may disturb critical elk winter range.
At issue is an application from Cimarex Energy Co. of Denver to construct a gas processing and carbon sequestration plant on state land in Sublette County along the Wyoming Range Front in the Riley Ridge area.
Mike Wozniak, an attorney for Cimarex, said Thursday the project will be the largest sequestration project in the world.
But the Wyoming Game and Fish Department opposes the specific site chosen by the company on the grounds that the state parcel includes crucial winter range for the largest wintering elk herd in Sublette County - more than 200 head.
According to a May 21 letter from Game and Fish Director Terry Cleveland to the Office of State Lands and Investments, Cimarex has an alternate option to build the plant on an adjacent section of private land on the periphery of the winter range which would have less impact on the elk.
The department strongly recommended the plant be located on the alternate site, Cleveland's letter said.
During Thursday's state board meeting, Gov. Dave Freudenthal, the chairman, reported that he had met earlier with supporters of the project and asked them not to bring the application to Thursday's meeting given the lack of any resolution of the Game and Fish Department's concerns.
"The board clearly supports these kinds of projects," the governor said. The snag, he added, is the wildlife issue and that the company ruled out alternate locations for the plant.
Scott Stinson, a Cimarex official, said the state school section is the best site available. The company, he said, needs to tie down a site before moving into the project analysis phase with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.
At that point there will be multiple public hearings in Pinedale and the rest of Sublette County to give the public ample opportunities to comment on the project, Stinson said.
The site, he said, is located between two wells, out of the wind, and protects the viewsheds of the Piney Creek drainages and the Lander cutoff of the Oregon Trail.
"We've done everything to minimize the impact," he added.
Dan Budd is a Sublette County rancher and former legislator who holds a grazing lease on the school section and owns property on two sides of the state tract.
Budd, who spoke in favor of the project, said the area is not a major elk calving ground.
"This is by far the most acceptable spot," Budd said of the school section.
Vern Stelter, state critical habitat protection coordinator with the Game and Fish Department, said that although the school section is not a major elk calving area, it is dead in the middle of an important elk wintering area.
One option is to move the plant site onto the Budd ranch, Stelter said, where there would be less impact on the elk herd.
The last meeting with the company officials, he said, produced no resolution.
Secretary of State Max Maxfield said he gave weight to Budd's testimony. He made a motion to approve the special-use lease application, but it died for lack of a second.
Treasurer Joe Meyer and Superintendent of Public Instruction Jim McBride said they learned of the application only last week.
Freudenthal said he personally wanted the board to take no action Thursday, noting the 'contentious nature' of ventures of this sort in that part of the state at the present time.
Sublette County is in the heart of heated natural gas activity.
Freudenthal asked the staff of the Office of State Land and Investments to analyze the project and wildlife concerns and report back to the board at the August meeting.
Although there is a risk for the company to proceed with no specific site, it doesn't preclude the Bureau of Land Management from proceeding with its analysis, he said.
Ultimately, he said, it may get down to a choice between the revenue and the wildlife.
The plant will recover methane and helium from the Madison formation in the Riley Ridge Federal Unit and will reinject all byproduct gases such as carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulfide back into the formation.
No liquid petroleum or sulfur products will be produced, according to a report to the board.
Contact Joan Barron at joan.barron@trib.com or by phone at 307-632-1244.
* Last we knew: Cimarex Energy Co. plans a natural gas processing and carbon sequestration plant in Sublette County on a section of state school land.
* The latest: The Wyoming Game and Fish Department opposes the plant site because is in the middle of a critical elk winter range.
* What's next: The Wyoming Board of Land Commissioners' staff will do a further analysis of the project and report at the August board meeting.]]->