Energy, Utilities & Water  June 23, 2016

Weld commissioners push back consideration of oil-well project near middle school

GREELEY — Weld County commissioners next week will consider an application from a Denver-based oil and gas company that wants to drill up to 24 horizontal wells near a middle school in unincorporated east Greeley.

Extraction Oil and Gas LLC won unanimous approval from the county planners for the project on June 7 despite protests from about a dozen residents — and several more at a recent Greeley-Evans School District 6 board meeting — and was to face the county commissioners on Wednesday. However, one commissioner requested a one-week delay because of a “family situation,” said county spokesman Jennifer Finch. The hearing was postponed, and has been rescheduled for 10 a.m. June 29.

The company wants to bring in 50 workers for a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week operation to drill on a site along the east side of Cherry Avenue just north of 24th Street, It wants to add 18 oil tanks, two water tanks, two separators, two meter houses, four vapor-recovery units, eight emission-control devices and two vapor-recovery towers — all on a tract outside the Greeley city limits but zoned for low-density residential development and located a quarter-mile from the Bella Romero Academy 4-8 Campus, 1400 E. 20th St.

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Extraction’s application materials state that the well pad will be drilled in two phases taking about 240 days each, and that landscaping will be installed after the first phase. The company is pledging to install temporary sound-blocking walls during the drilling and completion, and plans to power its drilling rig from a highline power line instead of a noisy generator — although it acknowledges that that idea would require infrastructure supplied by a power company.

Extraction’s request comes close on the heels of its involvement in another controversy involving the Triple Creek Directional Project inside the city limits. The Greeley Planning Commission unanimously rejected Extraction’s plan to drill 22 wells in that west Greeley neighborhood at 18th Street and 71st Avenue, but the city council overturned that ruling and approved the project.

GREELEY — Weld County commissioners next week will consider an application from a Denver-based oil and gas company that wants to drill up to 24 horizontal wells near a middle school in unincorporated east Greeley.

Extraction Oil and Gas LLC won unanimous approval from the county planners for the project on June 7 despite protests from about a dozen residents — and several more at a recent Greeley-Evans School District 6 board meeting — and was to face the county commissioners on Wednesday. However, one commissioner requested a one-week delay because of a “family situation,” said county spokesman Jennifer Finch. The…

Dallas Heltzell
With BizWest since 2012 and in Colorado since 1979, Dallas worked at the Longmont Times-Call, Colorado Springs Gazette, Denver Post and Public News Service. A Missouri native and Mizzou School of Journalism grad, Dallas started as a sports writer and outdoor columnist at the St. Charles (Mo.) Banner-News, then went to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch before fleeing the heat and humidity for the Rockies. He especially loves covering our mountain communities.
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