From The Colorado Independent - By David O. Williams
New York City’s Department of Environmental Protection last week issued a report that casts serious doubts on the common natural gas drilling process of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” which injects water, sand and chemicals deep underground to free up more gas.
By Chris Woodka - The Pueblo Chieftain
The state is pondering proposed pipelines to move water from most areas of the state to the Front Range in an attempt to meet future water demands.Not all will be built, and none has been officially endorsed.
Nevertheless, the Colorado Water Conservation Board looked at them in a preliminary report released last June.
Strategies in the report that move water from one basin to another include:
Read more
From: Loveland Connection, By Carl McCutchen 12/21/2009
Anyone walking into Tom Hewson’s chemistry class at Thompson Valley High School might disregard the 55-gallon fish tank near the doorway as home for a class pet, but for most of the students at TVHS, it’s far more than that.The fish tank, currently full of about 85 infant rainbow trout, is an experiment, a project and a learning tool.
“We raise trout from eggs to small fingerlings to then be stocked in a local watershed,” Hewson said.
The project, which Hewson said wouldn’t be done until later this year, started when he received a phone call from officials with the Denver chapter of Trout Unlimited last spring. Read more
According to the Census Bureau, Colorado's population has grown by 722,000 from 2000-2009. The state's population now exceeds 5 million.
Fort Collins Coloradoan - by Kevin Duggan • KevinDuggan@coloradoan.com
Proponents say NISP is needed to provide water for future growth. They also say not building the project would ultimately prove more costly for participants as they acquire the water they need.Critics say the project would cause severe environmental damage to the river. Opponents also say other steps, such as increased conservation, should be taken to meet the region's water needs.
So far the process of crafting an EIS for the project has taken almost six year and cost more than $5 million. Read more
Colorado Independent - by David O. Williams
Using chemical tracers to make sure hydraulic fracturing fluids aren’t contaminating groundwater supplies may be off the radar of Colorado officials who regulate the state’s natural gas industry, but the concept is contained in what could be a precedent-setting plan crafted by the cities of Grand Junction and Palisade. Read more
DUSTIN BLEIZEFFER Casper Star-Tribune | Posted: Thursday, December 3, 2009
The EPA recently put a hold on a handful of water discharge permit applications with the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality.In a series of recent letters, the EPA has noted that Wyoming regulators appear to be using a permit scheme that does not meet Wyoming’s own water quality standard intended to protect agricultural uses. That criticism follows a September report by two New Mexico scientists also indicating that Wyoming’s water discharge permit scheme is based on flawed science. Read more
The Pueblo Chieftain - Chris Woodka
Likewise, the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project is shifting toward more municipal use. In the first 30 years of diversions, beginning in the early 1970s, nearly three-fourths of the water was used on farms. Now, as cities realize more need, more than half is being allocated for municipal use, as required by a water court decree. Twin Lakes, the first large-scale diversion through a tunnel under the Rockies, was built by farmers in the early 1930s to provide ample water for crops in Crowley County. The tunnel and shares in the lakes were sold to municipal interests, and the lakes were enlarged as part of the Fry-Ark Project in the 1970s. Read the article
Editorial - tuesday, Dec. 1
For more than a century, as Colorado water law was enshrined in transmountain diversion after transmountain diversion, the West Slope suffered these indignities as long as there was sufficient water for agriculture. Now that energy development, a robust tourism economy, agriculture and endangered species all compete for this most precious of resources on this side of the Divide, the prevailing reality could scarcely be more fundamentally different than it was as these laws were being etched in granite.At the very least, Denver Water should be forced to mitigate the impacts of any further diversions from the Fraser Valley, where a seriously depleted river already represents the ultimate limit to development, and a once-world class fishery teeters on the brink. Read more
From Men's Journal - Bill Gifford
Can Interior Secretary Ken Salazar save the last best place in his native Colorado? BILL GIFFORD reports on the fierce conservation fight and reality check of Salazar and President Obama’s plan to move America beyond “drill, baby, drill” as the answer to our energy needs. Read more
