Louisville enacts O&G moratorium

LOUISVILLE — Louisville is the latest Front Range city to restrict oil and gas operations in the aftermath of Senate Bill 181’s passage.

The Louisville City Council unanimously adopted an emergency ordinance to impose a six-month moratorium as soon as any company files a permit to drill in the city, and require oil and gas companies to make a separate registration with city officials alongside the state application.

There are no active wells in the city, and no company has filed to drill within city limits since 1999.

The moratorium is a hedge against an operator filing for a permit and requiring the city council to scramble for a response in case council members aren’t available for an emergency meeting or if new councilors want to review city policy more closely.

“We don’t really have any reason to believe that suddenly, oil and gas activity is going to pick up in the city of Louisville,” City Attorney Kathleen Kelly said. “This is really a precautionary measure.”

Several local governments have moved to hold up oil and gas development in the wake of SB 181. Boulder County, Lafayette, Broomfield and Erie have all declared moratoriums on new drilling as they produce their own regulations, while Adams County used its newfound powers to double the state’s minimum setback rule setting the amount of space a rig has to be from a public building or home.

Activists in Longmont are pushing the bounds of SB 181 further, attempting to reinstate a full ban on fracking in the city years after the Colorado Supreme Court struck the law down.

On the other hand, Weld County created its own oil and gas permitting office to speed up the process in the county, which is the dominant producer in Colorado.

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