New Energy Project at Monument

The Bush administration announced plans Monday to allow oil and gas companies to expand beyond the boundaries of their leases at the Canyons of the Ancients National Monument in southwest Colorado.

It marks the first time exploration has been permitted to extend outside leased areas at a monument.

Environmental groups say the decision is one of the clearest examples of the administration’s policy of increasing energy development on the nation’s most-prized public lands.

The Bureau of Land Management approved a seismic exploration project to begin Friday at the Canyons of the Ancients near Durango, allowing energy companies holding oil and gas leases at the monument to delve into nearly 1,900 acres of unleased land.

With about 85% of the 164,000-acre monument already leased for energy exploration, the BLM said the new project will provide a better map of the size and shape of the fossil fuel reserves under the monument.

Environmental groups counter that the encroachment into unleased lands will not only do damage to sensitive biological and archeological areas but set a dangerous precedent.

“They are going to ... leave it wide open to development,” said Mark Pearson, executive director of the San Juan Citizens’ Alliance, a Durango group that monitors oil and gas issues on public land in the area. “If it can happen here, it can happen anywhere. This doesn’t bode well for other monuments around the country.”

Pearson said his group would appeal the decision.

LouAnn Jacobson, the monument’s manager, said the new exploration is the most equitable way to balance the preservation of archeological sites and still allow lessees to drill.

One goal is to prevent companies drilling on private land near the monument from siphoning the oil and gas reservoirs that exist under the BLM land, she said.

President Bush has made no secret of his goal of increasing energy development on public lands. Expanding production at home, he argues, will ease America’s dependence on energy sources abroad.

He wants to drill for oil and gas in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and his administration kept pushing for this even as national environmental groups made it clear that killing the initiative was their prime goal. The House approved a scaled-back development plan for the region, but the Senate rejected it.

The administration’s priorities led the BLM to open an office to increase energy production and make energy development a key factor in weighing decisions on the use of public lands.

Heidi McIntosh, conservation director for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, said her group is fighting similar energy development near national parks and monuments in Utah. It’s all part of a step-by-step plan to change the complexion of public lands, she said.

“It’s a sensible way to manage public resources if you are beholden to energy companies,” McIntosh said. “This is the administration’s way to dismantle national monuments under the radar screen. They are doing it this way because they know that the American public would not allow this to happen, so they come at it in the stealth mode. They are hoping the American public is not noticing they are giving public lands away to the energy companies.”

Jacobson acknowledged that the exploration could be the first step toward allowing more leasing in the Canyons of the Ancients monument, which was established two years ago and is home to the highest concentration of Anasazi archeological sites in the country.

She said that before allowing new leases, there would be an extensive review of the environmental effect of more drilling.

The expanded exploration does not allow new drilling but will bring “thumper trucks,” 30-ton vehicles that place large steel pads on the ground that send seismic waves deep below the surface. The signal bounces back and creates a map of subterranean resources.

The trucks and their support team, which includes four all-terrain vehicles, are considered by environmental groups to be as damaging as drilling platforms.

Jacobson said the vehicles will use existing roads and trails where possible. If the machines make more than a 3-inch indentation in the soil, she said, the exploration will stop.

Environmental groups warned that the monument’s extensive archeological sites could be imperiled by the new project. Jacobson said an archeologist will be on hand to protect the ancient paintings and dwellings.

In announcing its decision, the agency cited two exceptions to the monument’s policy of not awarding new energy leases. One exception allows for drilling in order to conserve oil and gas reservoirs already in production. The other is to prevent drainage of oil and gas.

Theoretically, the newly leased areas would tap into these underground reservoirs and capture the “leaking” oil or gas.

The monument is a prodigious supplier of carbon dioxide, producing 272 billion cubic feet of the gas in 2000, which yielded $8.6 million in royalties to the BLM. Carbon dioxide is sometimes injected into aging oil fields to force crude oil to the surface.

In 2000 the monument produced 210,400 barrels or oil and 2.1 billion cubic feet of gas.

Jacobson said that the fate of the Canyons of the Ancients was decided by the Clinton administration, which ensured energy development would continue there. “The people have a right to develop those areas,” she said.

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Cart reported from Denver, Shogren from Washington, D.C.