{"id":34688,"date":"2018-06-03T07:37:02","date_gmt":"2018-06-03T12:37:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=34688"},"modified":"2018-06-03T07:37:02","modified_gmt":"2018-06-03T12:37:02","slug":"troubled-gas-firm-drops-request-to-dodge-drilling-limits-near-new-mexicos-methane-hot-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=34688","title":{"rendered":"Troubled Gas Firm Drops Request to Dodge Drilling Limits Near New Mexico&#8217;s Methane Hot Spot"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"page__title title\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2018\/05\/30\/hilcorp-natural-gas-well-drilling-limits-san-juan-basin-new-mexico\">Troubled Gas Firm Drops Request to Dodge Drilling Limits Near New Mexico&#8217;s Methane Hot Spot<\/a><\/h3>\n<article class=\"node-12966 node node-blog node-promoted view-mode-full clearfix\">\n<div class=\"field field-name-field-bimage field-type-image field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/sites\/beta.desmogblog.com\/files\/styles\/full_width_blog_image\/public\/blogimages\/Don%20on%20ranch.jpg?itok=8a85jh2A\" alt=\"New Mexico resident Don Schreiber on his ranch next to oil and gas equipment\" width=\"810\" height=\"540\" \/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"new-horizontal-social-bar clearfix\">\n<div class=\"new-horizontal-share-wrapper new-horizontal-email-wrapper clearfix last\">Today, one of New Mexico&#8217;s largest oil and gas producers, Hilcorp Energy, dropped its recently filed request to increase the number of wells it can drill or frack\u00a0in the San Juan Basin, already home to tens of thousands of gas wells. Hilcorp&#8217;s proposal also would have\u00a0shut\u00a0the public out of the decision-making process\u00a0by establishing an \u201cadministrative approval\u201d\u00a0process.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<p>Back in 2014, this corner of northern New Mexico made <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2015\/jan\/04\/leaking-methane-gas-plume-us\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">international headlines<\/a> when <span class=\"caps\">NASA<\/span> researchers discovered a persistent methane plume the size of Delaware.\u00a0Two years later, they <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpl.nasa.gov\/news\/news.php?feature=6591\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">pinned<\/a>\u00a0one of the main sources of this methane \u201chot spot\u201d to natural gas wells, pipelines, storage tanks, and processing plants in the San Juan Basin.\u00a0A second peer-reviewed <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/energyexchange\/2017\/06\/15\/new-study-confirms-again-new-mexicos-methane-hot-spot-largely-tied-to-oil-and-gas-pollution\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">study last year<\/a> confirmed those findings.<\/p>\n<p>On Friday, state regulators were scheduled to hear Hilcorp&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.emnrd.state.nm.us\/OCD\/documents\/5-31OCDHEARING.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">request<\/a> to amend the state&#8217;s well spacing regulations, which would have allowed the company to drill more wells or target different formations than the rules currently\u00a0allow.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe effect of that would be that rather than having a public hearing process where each of those items is heard, that entire process would be done away with and it would only require the local Oil Conservation Division\u00a0official,\u201d said Don Schreiber, a rancher who lives in the San Juan Basin and had opposed the rule change. \u201cHis name is Charlie Perrin and the oil company could just walk in and say &#8216;Charlie, we want to drill some wells or recomplete some wells and just sign right\u00a0here.&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Troubled Gas Firm Drops Request to Dodge Drilling Limits Near New Mexico&#8217;s Methane Hot Spot Today, one of New Mexico&#8217;s largest oil and gas producers, Hilcorp Energy, dropped its recently filed request to increase the number of wells it can drill or frack\u00a0in the San Juan Basin, already home to tens of thousands of gas [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[5317,331,20307,20306,929,554,6146,20308,11167],"class_list":["post-34688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","tag-desmog-blog","tag-fracking","tag-hilcorp-energy","tag-methane-gas","tag-nasa","tag-natural-gas","tag-new-mexico","tag-san-juan-basin","tag-sharon-kelly"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34688"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34688\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34689,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34688\/revisions\/34689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}