Lafayette may impose a yearlong moratorium on any new oil and gas development applications within city limits, according to city documents released Thursday.
It’s the latest in a string of watershed oil and gas regulations proposed in recent weeks — spurred in part by a company’s announcement earlier this month to drill in the heart of the city — though its implications are the farthest reaching.
Lafayette’s City Council will consider the first reading of the ordinance Tuesday. Official approval would come only months after Boulder County’s five-year moratorium expired in May, and could place the city in the crosshairs of a potentially costly lawsuit.
Representatives for the Colorado Oil and Gas Association could not be reached for comment Thursday.
The ordinance would halt the “submission, acceptance, processing, and approval… of all land use applications, including all special use review applications” aimed at the “exploration or extraction, and related operations and activities, of oil and gaseous materials.”
It would also include pending applications and applications to “expand the scope of existing special use review approvals.”
The legalese essentially calls for no new drilling, or any oil and gas development, within city limits for the next year.
On Tuesday, the city’s Planning Commission tabled a landmark ordinance requiring operators to map their pipelines throughout the city, as well as overhauling its setback requirements — potentially the state’s strictest — over concerns that the measure was woefully insufficient.
8 North LLC, a subsidiary of Extraction Oil and Gas LLC, has applied for a state drilling and spacing order for a 1,280-acre area between Arapahoe and Baseline roads in the Lafayette-Erie area.
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