Washington – Congress today dropped a plan to speed up oil-shale development in western Colorado, Utah and Wyoming.
The proposal by House Resources Chairman Richard Pombo, R-Calif., would have eliminated requirements for consultation with state and local officials, limited environmental reviews and capped royalty payments.
It would have thrown out a compromise on shale development worked out with Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo., in the energy bill that passed last summer.
Pombo added the proposal to a five-year budget plan in October. But when the House voted on the final version of the bill this morning, the shale language had been stripped out.
No reason was given, but Democrats had been trying to get rid of the language since it was introduced in October.
Rep. Mark Udall, D-Eldorado Springs, said the plan looked like the policies that led to Colorado’s 1982 “Black Sunday” shale crash.
“Many Coloradans remember the mistaken crash-development policy of the Carter Administration,” Udall said. “It was a mistake then and it would be a mistake now.”
Some geologists say up to 1 trillion barrels of oil lie bound in the 1,000-foot-thick shale formations of western Colorado, Wyoming and Utah – as much as the rest of the world’s proven oil reserves. But other experts say widespread oil-shale development is years away.
Mike Soraghan can be reached at 202-662-8730 or msoraghan@denverpost.com.
