The state of Wyoming is suing the Department of the Interior (DOI) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in opposition to new regulations on hydraulic fracturing.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, March 24 in the U.S District Court of Wyoming, contends oversight on hydraulic fracturing operations are delegated to the states and not subject to federal regulation.
“Wyoming and other states have demonstrated meaningful leadership,” Mead said in a letter to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell. “The federal government, including the Bureau of Land Management should defer to state leadership, not implement duplicative regulation.”
Jerimiah Rieman, Natural Resource Policy Director for Gov. Matt Mead, said the biggest concern for the state is the additional layers of regulation without any environmental benefit. The Western Energy Alliance (WEA) and the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) also filed lawsuits against the DOI regarding regulation on fracking.
“These new mandates on hydraulic fracturing by the federal government, however, are the complete opposite of common-sense,” Barry Russell, president of the IPAA, said in a press release.
“The BLM struggles to meet its current workload of leasing, environmental analysis, permitting, monitoring, inspecting and otherwise administering the federal onshore oil and natural gas program, yet it is undertaking an entirely new regulatory regime that it has neither the resources nor the expertise to implement,” Tim Wegley, president of Western Energy Alliance, said in the same press release.
Hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking, is the process used by many mining companies of spraying chemically treated water at high pressures into wells to break open oil-bearing rocks. Wyoming has several regulations on fracking, and became the first state to regulate disclosure of chemicals used in the process in 2010. Many environmentalists believe the practice leads to contamination of groundwater that could affect drinking water supplies.
This claim may be valid in Wyoming. In 2010 the EPA conducted an investigation into Pavilion’s groundwater due to citizen complaints of odd smells and tastes in their water, and released a report in 2011 revealing compounds such as lead and nitrate were found in water samples. The EPA said this was likely due to fracking activities too close to drinking wells..
Jill Morrison, organizer for the Powder River Basin Resource Council, said Wyoming has not always led the way in terms of chemical disclosure. The Resource Council litigated a case in 2014 that reversed a decision by the Natrona County District Court allowing companies to continue keeping certain chemicals from disclosure if the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission deem them a “trade secret.” “Before that ruling if industry said it was a trade secret then the WOGCC said ok without any legitimate review of that fact,” Morrison said.
Under the new regulations, states can apply for a variance ruling, which allows them to follow regulations already in place and disregarding the BLM’s rules.
“At this time it is unclear how or even if the variance provision will apply or if Wyoming will qualify for a variance,” Rieman said. “Without a clear variance, oil and gas operators in Wyoming will be in a position of responding to two masters.”
Amber Wilson, Environmental Quality Advocate for the Wyoming Outdoor Council, said a lawsuit might not be the wisest course of action for the state to take.
“Lawsuits are easy to file. The harder work is keeping up the conversation, focusing on the merits of rules and on the people and resources those rules seek to protect,” Wilson said.
