Landowners, gas drillers in turf battle

RIFLE, Colo. (AP) -- For 10 years, Garland and Diana Anderson have lived on a western Colorado mesa and loved nearly everything -- the mountain views, the sunsets, the antelope and elk.
But the Andersons have seen fewer animals since gas drilling began in their subdivision south of Rifle. Then they learned that a company plans to build a well on their 80 acres and that there is little they can do about it, because they don't own the rights to the minerals underneath.
"I wouldn't buy there now and nobody else wants to, either," Garland Anderson said over a recent breakfast in a small diner.
Similar complaints are cropping up around the Rockies, which last fall were described by the head of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission as "ground zero" in the Bush administration's drive to increase domestic energy development.
Opposition
The plan has run into unusually broad opposition in western Colorado, from relatively new arrivals like the Andersons to veteran landowners who remember when the region's oil shale industry went bust in 1982. Even commissioners in revenue-starved rural counties say energy companies are running roughshod over local rights.
Many here support multiple-use for the West's sprawling public lands, including responsible energy development. But they worry that this new boom threatens not only the environment but the outdoors-based economy that has replaced the oil-and-gas backbone of the 1970s and '80s.
Keith Goddard said he questions whether some of the deer and elk hunters he has guided for years on western Colorado's Roan Plateau will return if there is widespread drilling.
"Guys paying $2,500 to $3,500 don't want to be sitting down, and then here's a gas rig going," Goddard said. "That puts me out of business. But even if I weren't a hunter, I'd be concerned. What price do you put on wildlife?"
Industry representatives insist they can help meet the demands of an energy-hungry country in a responsible way, pointing to new technology and drilling techniques that have less effect on the environment.
Wells popping up
Bev and Sam Sharp hope that isn't idle talk. Four years ago, the retired teachers from Southern California moved to a house atop a bluff in Pinedale, in the western foothills of Wyoming's Wind River Mountains. They live along a migration route for mule deer and pronghorn antelope thought to be one of the longest such corridors in the Western Hemisphere.
Since then, hundreds of gas wells have been drilled in the area and more are in the works.
"People are moving this way for beautiful landscapes and wildlife, and we're afraid that's going to be taken out at an alarmingly quick rate," Bev Sharp said.
Mineral rights
Hunters, ranchers, environmentalists and others say energy companies are building roads and drilling wells without working with landowners, a claim the companies deny. Some of the fiercest fights involve the so-called "split estate," in which landowners have surface rights but someone else owns the rights to the underground minerals.
Companies that own or lease the minerals are entitled to develop them, and landowners say they have little leverage or protection.
Dave Cesark, environmental specialist for the exploration and production division of Oklahoma-based Williams Cos., one of the biggest players in the Rockies, said his company works hard to keep landowners happy.
But he concedes conflicts are becoming more common.
"People are moving here, building froofy homes and there's a lot of development in an area that hasn't seen a lot of development," Cesark said. "It's almost a land battle."
More than 100 economists last month told President Bush and Western governors the environment is arguably the West's "greatest, long-run economic strength." They also said the energy bust in the mid-1980s forced communities from Montana to New Mexico to diversify their business base -- progress they fear might be erased with a return to oil and gas.
"It directly threatens the source of growth and prosperity this region has had," said Tom Power, chairman of the University of Montana's economics department.
Some favor drilling
Others, however, are eager to cash in. Drilling was expected to raise $11.6 million in property taxes and $1.6 million in other taxes for Colorado's Garfield County last year alone.
"We are basically pro-energy," said Don Davis, a commissioner in nearby Rio Blanco County. He said the industry, from coal mining to gas drilling, contributes as much as 80 percent of the county's revenue.
Now comes a new energy rush: The government estimates that Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming contain 41 percent of the nation's gas reserves.
Greg Schnacke, administrator of the Colorado Oil & amp; Gas Association trade group, said the Rockies will play a key role in energy development as long as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska and offshore drilling are off-limits.