Weld

Driven by oilfield technology advances, Colorado has doubled its natural gas production since 2001, boosting the state’s economy in the process, according to a report by the Colorado Petroleum Council, a division of the American Petroleum Institute (API).

Somewhat shunned following the 2014 global oil price crash, Colorado’s Denver-Julesburg (DJ) Basin seems to be on everyone’s dance card again, being wooed by Wall Street, industry and government representatives looking at potential oil and natural gas growth areas.

Three people, including a DCP Midstream LP employee, were injured Thursday after a fire broke out during routine maintenance on a natural gas gathering line in Colorado’s northeastern Weld County.

Colorado’s top oil and natural gas regulator told executives in Denver Tuesday that adopting a culture in the onshore that goes above and beyond what’s legally required will do more than anything to achieve community acceptance.

Elected officials in Adams County, northeast of Denver, CO, have rejected a land use permit request for the proposed 435-mile, natural gas liquids (NGL) Front Range Pipeline, which is targeted to traverse the county on its way to an interconnection in the Texas panhandle.

Calling them a model for other states, the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) on Tuesday unanimously approved new rules for the disclosure of chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing (fracking), including trade secret protections sought by the oil and gas industry. The Colorado Oil and Gas Association (COGA) said the state “now has the strongest hydraulic fracturing rule in the country,” and environmental groups praised the action.

There was no change in status Tuesday for a CIG rupture that occurred Sunday night in Weld County, CO (see Daily GPI, March 25), according to a pipeline spokesman. The company still anticipates there will be no interruptions in service and will post a bulletin board notice when repairs are completed, he said.