MONUMENT, Colo.—A Texas company could hear by spring whether it will be allowed to drill two exploratory natural gas wells in the Pike National Forest.
If the application by Dyad Petroleum Co. of Midland, Texas is approved, it would be the first energy exploration in the forest since the 1950s and the first drilling in El Paso County in more than 15 years.
Opponents of drilling on the wooded slopes of Mount Herman worry that success by Dyad Petroleum could unleash the kind of energy development seen elsewhere in the state. The state issued a record 6,368 drilling permits last year.
“If they find something, it’s not just going to be here. It’s going to be about the entire Front Range,” said Chris Tirpak, president of Friends of the Monument Preserve, which opposes the drilling. “If they find it, they’re going to be looking all the way up Rampart Range to Denver and all the way up to Fort Collins and Cheyenne.”
But state records show that despite at least 104 attempts in the past century, nobody has ever made a profit out of drilling in El Paso County. Some experts don’t think the area’s geology is favorable for serious gas extraction.
“The chances of that becoming another basin development are pretty slim,” said Ernie Gillingham, surface reclamation specialist with the Bureau of Land Management in Canon City. “It’s just not a proven basin. Way over 90 percent of wildcat wells are plugged and abandoned.”
Wildcat wells are drilled in areas with no proven gas reserves.
Dyad Petroleum asked the U.S. Forest Service in 2002 to drill on two sites. Jeff Hovermale, forestry technician for Pike National Forest, said the company decided not to hire a contractor to do an environmental assessment, leaving the work to the Forest Service, which delayed the decision.
The Forest Service expects to release the assessment in March or April. A 30-day comment period will follow.
The company wants to bulldoze 4.5 acres on both sites and set up 90-foot high drilling rigs that would run for about two months. Some roads would have to be built to accommodate heavy truck traffic.
