Fracking pits approved for development near Paonia Reservoir

Locals still concerned

The Spadafora Water Storage Facility was approved by the Gunnison County Planning Commission on Friday, March 6. Three water storage pits, each with a pump station and a volume of about 9,240,000 gallons, will sit on roughly 19 acres and will store and recycle produced water for drilling and gas well operations. The approval document says fluids will be transported via existing buried pipelines. When the project is complete, the pits will be closed, the liners removed and the area reclaimed.

The three fracking (hydraulic fracturing) pits will be located about 2.5 miles from Sheep Creek near Paonia Reservoir and many fear it could negatively impact species of fowl, big game and wetland habitats in the area, as well as farms and vineyards downstream. Many local residents and environmental agencies have battled the development proposal from Gunnison Energy Corporation but the corporation has officially won the fight.
Listed benefits in the approval document of what the Planning Commission calls a “potentially significant impact oil and gas operation” are as follows:
—Substantially reduce the impacts of truck traffic associated with water transportation during drilling and completion operations.
—Substantially reduce the number of frack tanks required on individual well pads for completion/fracking operations.
—Nearly eliminate the use of fresh water resources for completion operation.
Russ Forrest, director of Community Development, told the News the decision to approve the pits was unanimous. “There were no dissenting votes,” he said.
The Planning Commission outlined conditions for approval in great detail. “Prior to operation of the Facility, [Gunnison Energy] shall provide a copy of the final Operating Plan and final Spill Prevention, Containment and Countermeasure Plan to the Community Development Department,” states one condition of the permit.
Gunnison Energy will also meet with the Planning Commission and the Board of County Commissioners once per year at a minimum to provide a status update and to discuss “reasonably foreseeable oil and gas development” at the facility.
Land use conditions have been put in place in accordance with current regulations and possible county impacts. The Oil and Gas Operation Permit could be revoked or suspended at any time if Gunnison Energy is found to have provided misleading information or failed to disclose any pertinent facts that could make such information less misleading.
The permit applies strictly to this project proposal and, according to the approval document, “implies no approval of similar use in the same or different location and/or with different impacts on the environment and community.” If Gunnison Energy wants to do anything more than has already been approved, they will have to submit a separate application that will be evaluated based on the proposed project’s compliance with current regulations and its impact on the county.