[Federal Register Volume 71, Number 114 (Wednesday, June 14, 2006)]
[Notices]
[Pages 34388-34389]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E6-9255]


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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

Bureau of Land Management

[CO-110]


Notice of Intent To Prepare an Amendment to the White River Field 
Office Resource Management Plan and Associated Environmental Impact 
Statement for Oil and Gas Development, Meeker, CO

AGENCY: Bureau of Land Management, Interior.

ACTION: Notice of intent.

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SUMMARY: Pursuant to Section 102(2)(c) of the National Environmental 
Policy Act of 1969 and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 
1976, notice is hereby given that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), 
White River Field Office (WRFO) located in Meeker, CO, will be 
directing the preparation of a Resource Management Plan (RMP) Amendment 
and associated Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The BLM invites 
the public to participate in this planning effort.

DATES: The scoping comment period will commence with the publication of 
this notice and will end 45 days after publication of this notice. 
Public meetings will be held during the scoping comment period in 
Meeker and Rifle, Colorado. Comments on the scope of the EIS, including 
concerns, issues, or proposed alternatives that should be considered, 
should be submitted in writing to the address below. The dates of 
public meetings to be held in Meeker and Rifle, Colorado will be 
announced through the local media, newsletters, and WRFO National 
Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) mailing list. The draft EIS is expected 
to be available for public review and comment in September 2007 and the 
final EIS is expected to be available early in 2008.

ADDRESSES: Written comments should be sent to: Jane Peterson, 73554 
Highway 64, Meeker, Colorado 81641. Written comments, including names 
and addresses of respondents, will be available for public review at 
the offices of the BLM White River Field Office, 73554 Highway 64, 
Meeker, Colorado 81641, during normal working hours (7:30 a.m. to 4:30 
p.m., except holidays). Submissions from organizations or businesses 
will be made available for public inspection in their entirety. 
Individuals may request confidentiality with respect to their name, 
address, and phone number. If you wish to have your name or street 
address withheld from public review, or from disclosure under the 
Freedom of Information Act, you must state this prominently at the 
beginning of your comment. Such requests will be honored to the extent 
allowed by law. Comment contents will not be kept confidential. 
Responses to the comments will be published as part of the Proposed 
Resource Management Plan/Final Environmental Impact Statement.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For further information or to have 
your name added to our mailing list, contact Jane Peterson, WRFO Oil 
and Gas EIS Project Manager, at (970) 244-3027 or alternately at (970) 
878-3828. E-mail can be directed to [email protected] and mail 
can be sent to the address above.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The RMP Amendment proposes to modify the 
level of oil and gas development within the WRFO boundaries above what 
was anticipated in the 1997 WRFO RMP. The EIS will analyze the 
potential impacts of increased oil and gas development on a field 
office-wide level. Citizens are requested to help identify issues or 
concerns and to provide input on BLM's proposed action. The White River 
Field Office (WRFO), Meeker, Colorado, is located in northwestern 
Colorado primarily in Rio Blanco County, with other tracts located in 
Garfield and Moffat Counties and encompasses 1,455,900 acres of BLM 
surface estate and 365,000 acres of split mineral estate. The WRFO is 
experiencing unprecedented growth in the oil and gas energy program. 
The Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) Reauthorization of 2000 
directed the Department of the Interior to produce a scientific 
inventory of oil and gas resources and reserves underlying Federal 
lands. The EPCA-generated studies of five oil and gas basins (Montana 
Thrust Belt, Powder River, Green River, San Juan/Paradox, and Uinta/
Piceance), completed and presented to Congress in January, 2003, 
identified the Piceance Basin of Northwest Colorado, in which the WRFO 
is located, as one of five sub-basins in the continental United States 
with large reserves of undeveloped oil and gas energy potential. As a 
result of EPCA, higher oil and gas prices, and development of 
interstate transportation pipelines the WRFO is experiencing an oil and 
gas boom. The WRFO Resource Management Plan (RMP), approved in

[[Page 34389]]

1997, projected and analyzed a Reasonable Foreseeable Development (RFD) 
scenario of 1,100 oil and gas wells, with 10 acres of disturbance per 
well (including roads and pipelines), over a 20-year period 
(approximately 55 wells per year). The RFD projected that nearly 2/3 of 
the oil and gas development activity (or 800 wells) would take place 
south of Rangely, Colorado with the remaining activity dispersed 
throughout the remaining field office area. While this projection has 
been fairly accurate for the activity south of Rangely, the current and 
projected oil and gas activity in the Piceance Basin may soon far 
exceed the RFD/EIS impact analysis.
    The oil and gas industry has indicated that the potential exists to 
develop over 13,000 oil and gas wells in the Piceance Basin over the 
next 20 years. The current WRFO RMP/EIS does not adequately address 
this projected level of oil and gas development. The BLM has identified 
some preliminary planning criteria to guide the development of the 
plan. The following planning criteria have been proposed to guide the 
development of the plan, to avoid unnecessary data collection and 
analyses, and to ensure the plan is tailored to issues. Other criteria 
may be identified during the public scoping process. Proposed planning 
criteria include the following:
     The plan will comply with all applicable laws, regulations 
and current policies.
     Broad-based public participation will be an integral part 
of the planning and EIS process.
     The plan will recognize valid existing rights.
     Environmental protection and energy production are both 
desirable and necessary objectives of sound land management practices 
and are not to be considered mutually exclusive priorities
    The BLM will analyze the proposed action and no action 
alternatives, as well as other possible alternatives that could include 
alternative approaches to mitigation measures and/or conditions of 
approval for future oil and gas development in the planning area. 
Alternatives will be further defined as part of the planning process.

Vernon Rholl,
Acting Field Manager.
 [FR Doc. E6-9255 Filed 6-13-06; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 1610-DN-P