Tuesday, May 03, 2016

Colorado court overturns fracking bans

Colorado’s highest court overturned two cities’ bans on hydraulic fracturing Monday, ruling that state law preempts them. The state’s Supreme Court cited the main state law regulating oil and natural gas drilling and found that lawmakers clearly intended to severely limit the ability of cities and towns to regulate or outlaw the controversial practice also known as fracking. It’s a major loss for environmentalists, who have tried in recent years to get local fracking bans passed in places where state leaders are friendly to the oil and gas industry. “The Oil and Gas Conservation Act and the [Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation] Commission’s pervasive rules and regulations ... convince us that the state’s interest in the efficient and responsible development of oil and gas resources includes a strong interest in the uniform regulation of fracking,” the court wrote in striking down Longmont, Colo.’s ban on fracking. It had a similar finding for a five-year moratorium in Fort Collins, saying the measure “materially impedes the effectuation of the state’s interest in the efficient and responsible development of oil and gas resources.”...more

No comments: