It calls for phased Atlantic Rim gas drilling
DUSTIN BLEIZEFFER Star-Tribune energy reporter | Posted: Tuesday, August 21, 2007 12:00 am
Concerning the impact to wildlife, there's no disagreement. Yet there is a lawsuit.
The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership filed suit against the U.S. Department of Interior on Friday over the authorization of 2,000 new oil and gas wells in south-central Wyoming.
The Atlantic Rim project, according to the Interior's own Bureau of Land Management, would "have adverse impact to suitable habitat for many wildlife species," including iconic big game species including mule deer, elk and antelope.
The 1,000 miles of pipeline and 1,000 miles of new roads associated with the wells would transform the hunters' paradise "to an industrial setting," according to the BLM's Atlantic Rim environmental impact statement.
The conservation group, and others, agree. The rub is that the BLM said the development should proceed anyway.
Steve Belinda of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership said green-lighting a development with full knowledge of its adverse wildlife and environmental impacts violates the BLM's mandate to manage public lands in a "multiple use" manner.
"In these actions, we see a federal agency acting on behalf of only one user group, the energy industry," Belinda said in a prepared statement. "BLM is not fulfilling the multiple-use mandate it is legally obligated to follow. The time has come to hold the agency accountable."
But BLM officials say Americans demand energy resources, and sometimes that comes at the cost of another resource.
"When you look at multiple-use management, sometimes you look at impacts of resources to develop another resource," said Wyoming BLM spokesman Steven Hall.
Throughout the BLM's analysis of the project, the agency has underscored the economic benefits of developing some 1.35 trillion cubic feet of gas.
The 50-year development would generate an estimated $320 million in federal royalties (half goes to Wyoming), and $271 million in state severance taxes. In total, the project would generate some $6.4 billion, according to the BLM.
Wyoming isn't the only benefactor.
"It's the people in other states who depend on natural gas to both generate electricity and to heat their homes," Hall said.
The 1.35 trillion cubic feet of gas mined from the Atlantic Rim would be enough to heat 19.3 million homes for a year.
Though it acknowledges potentially devastating impacts to wildlife habitat and wildlife, the BLM also says those impacts can be averted through "adaptive management" practices. That means modifying surface use stipulations based on measured impacts during development.
For example, the BLM's Buffalo field office recently shifted priority to coal-bed methane applications in areas that do not overlie prime sage grouse habitat in the Powder River Basin. BLM officials said that decision came from the "adaptive management" mandate in a 2003 environmental impact statement for the development. And it based the new habitat priority on ongoing monitoring.
Hall noted that the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership targets the BLM's Atlantic Rim record of decision, but that won't be the final document guiding the development. Large oil and gas projects typically proceed under a series of smaller permits where stipulations can be tailored to site-specific considerations.
The partnership said it wants to see the Atlantic Rim project move forward, but under a phased development strategy - something the BLM didn't include in its list of options.
Belinda said hunting and recreation generates significant revenue, too. Outdoor recreation injects $730 billion into the U.S economy annually, according to a report by the Outdoor Industry Foundation.
Besides money and energy considerations, there's an obligation to maintain wildlife for future generations, said Dwayne Meadows of the partnership.
"This is a place where sportsmen from around the West and across the country come to fulfill hunting and fishing dreams on public land," Meadows said. "Interior's development plan would needlessly shut down this piece of publicly accessible sportsmen's paradise."
A spokesman for Anadarko Petroleum - a major developer in the Atlantic Rim area - said previously the company is taking steps to minimize harm to wildlife and that the development "will not adversely impact big game in the area."
Energy reporter Dustin Bleizeffer can be reached at (307) 577-6069 or dustin.bleizeffer@casperstartribune.net.