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Colorado’s oil production last year passed the 40 million bbl mark for the first time in 50 years, while natural gas and coalbed methane (CBM) production were down in the face of stubbornly low prices, according to preliminary data from the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC).

Colorado stakeholders in an ongoing voluntary water testing program related to oil and natural gas extraction activity support a statewide mandatory program, they said earlier this month, two days after the state government held its first public hearing on a proposed baseline groundwater monitoring program.

The Boulder County, CO, planning commission on Tuesday proposed to offer exploration and production (E&P) operators an option of expedited oil and natural gas drilling permits in return for meeting stricter environmental standards. An industry association spokesman told NGI’s Shale Daily they favored existing state mechanisms over the county proposal.

Already planted firmly on the side of states’ rights advocates in the debate about regulating hydraulic fracturing (fracking), Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead said Thursday he thinks the Republican Party platform and presidential candidate Mitt Romney recognize that the states must play a key role in the nation’s energy policy.

A special state appeal panel plans to rule in September which of two competing proposals would be authorized to build an 80-mile-long natural gas pipeline to Maine’s state capital, Augusta, and the surrounding Kennebec Valley. The chosen pipeline would bring natural gas to the area for the first time.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to hear an appeal of a property rights case and rule on whether the owner of the property in the Marcellus Shale also owns the shale gas it contains.

Don’t like today’s low natural gas prices? Hang on, they will change, eventually, ConocoPhillips Gas & Power’s Jim Duncan, manager of market research, told a Houston audience Thursday.

With most new oil/gas exploration and production (E&P) moving to the more populated eastern slope of the Colorado Rockies from its traditional rural west-central focus, the Colorado Oil and Gas Association (COGA) embarked last month on a three-month public service advertising campaign as part of a broader community outreach on the use of hydraulic fracturing (fracking). So far the campaign is raising more interest than anticipated, according to COGA, and mostly because anti-fracking groups are crying foul.

A local ordinance that bans oil and gas operations in the Town of Middlefield, NY, has been upheld by the Otsego County Supreme Court, the second time in a week that a New York state judge has ruled in favor of such a law.