Gas firm, preservationists at odds over drilling

A Bill Barrett Corp. spokesman said Thursday he is extremely confident that 30 years from now his company can leave fragile archaeological sites and wilderness study areas on the West Tavaputs Plateau in as good or better condition than they are today after the company has finished extracting natural gas from the area.

"You'll never hear me say we won't have impacts," Barrett communications manager Jim Felton said in an interview during an open house inside the Salt Lake City Library. "We think they're manageable."

A group critical of a proposal by Colorado-based Barrett and others to drill up to 807 more natural gas wells in the Tavaputs Plateau says Barrett's operations over the past four years have already had an impact on centuries-old panels of rock art throughout Nine Mile Canyon. At issue still is how to control dust kicked up by heavy industrial trucks going in and out of the canyon.

"If they're so sure of themselves, why is the dust problem still there?" asked Steve Tanner, chairman of the Nine Mile Canyon Coalition's impact research committee.

The Bureau of Land Management's Brad Higdon said efforts are ongoing to resolve the dust issue and that the solution is out there. What has surprised him during a public comment period for a draft environmental impact statement is that so little attention from wilderness advocates has been focused on Barrett's proposal.

"In this case it's taking a back seat to the Nine Mile Canyon issues," Higdon said.

There were several drilling alternatives on display at the open house that Higdon said reflect the BLM's hard work on finding ways to minimize surface disturbances in wilderness study areas above the canyon.

The public comment period ends May 1, and Higdon anticipates a final EIS by August. A decision is expected by this fall on how Barrett and others involved in increasing natural gas production in the area should proceed.

Felton said he envisions an environmentally progressive approach like Utah has never seen. Barrett has already spent $2 million on road issues and efforts to survey and preserve archaeological sites.

"There has not been so much as an arrowhead disturbed by our activity out there," Felton said. Because of Barrett's own studies, he said, those interested in the archaeology of Nine Mile know more today than before Barrett began drilling.