How Erie residents pushed back against a drilling project that would have reached 5 miles beneath the town

In The NOCO

One of the most unusual stories in recent memory about Colorado’s oil and gas industry popped up in the town of Erie. It was actually about what happens underneath Erie.
A company wanted to access some underground oil and gas located beneath the town. But Erie has more than 30,000 residents. So putting a fracking operation in the middle of neighborhoods and schools wasn’t going to be very popular.

Instead, the company, called Extraction Oil and Gas, proposed a plan to do what’s called horizontal drilling. They would set up their equipment on the outskirts of Erie – in unincorporated Weld County – which has fewer restrictions on drilling. Then they would drill horizontally for as far as five miles to the west – to tap into the oil and gas beneath the town.

But some residents in the town pushed back, saying they don’t want to live on top of an oil and gas operation. And now state regulators have had to get involved.

KUNC’s Rae Solomon has been following this story. Solomon spoke with In the NoCo’s Brad Turner and explained what might happen next – and what it could mean for how fracking is regulated at the local level.

For more on this issue, check out stories by the Boulder Reporting Lab and The Colorado Sun, which cover a recent hearing and decision by the Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission about the proposed drilling site.

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Host and Producer: Erin O'Toole
Producer: Ariel Lavery
Executive Producer: Brad Turner
Theme music by Robbie Reverb
Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions
In The NoCo is a production of KUNC News and Community Radio for Northern Colorado.