DENVER ─ Development conflicts are sure to continue as unconventional oil and gas exploration grows along with population and suburban residential expansion.

A point in case, according to Matt Lepore, director of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC), was EOG’s Jake well in northern Colorado.

“The first really successful horizontally shale well in Colorado is in Weld County. And since that discovery, horizontal drilling has taken off in the state, as has oil production in the state.”

Colorado is the fourth fastest-growing state in the country and highest concentration of growth is in the northern Front Range of the state, where the highest concentration of oil and gas development is under way, primarily in Niobrara shale, Lepore said. Weld County is has the second fastest growing county in the state, he added.

“Subdivisions are being developed where there has historically been oil and gas production.”

In Colorado several communities have placed bans or moratoriums on fracking or drilling operations, and there have been lawsuits to challenge the bans and moratoriums. In three cases, lawsuits were decided at the district court against the bans and moratoriums. Two of the decisions are currently being reviewed in appeals courts.

“In response to several voter initiated ballot initiatives, the governor convened a 21-member task force of industry, local governments, citizen and environmental groups to address the issue of local vs. state regulation of oil and gas. The task force made recommendations, and now our organization will be undertaking rule-making to implement some of those recommendations.”

Lepore presented data about Colorado oil and gas development that reveal an average of 2,400 new wells have been drilled in the state since 2009. “In six years, the number of horizontal wells increased from less than 2% to more than 65%, and in 2015 we expect it to be more than 75%,” he said.

“The tension has become, ‘what can local governments do vs. what the state can do as far as land use regulations’. Now the question is, exactly where is the line between state and local jurisdiction of oil and gas development and local control of traffic and emergency response?”

The COGCC has tried to work through conflicts in air and water quality in a couple of different ways. “In Colorado, we developed the Local Government Designee Program. A local government has a person on their staff that communicates with the COGCC and has access to all applications that comes in for their jurisdiction. The designee can comment on permits and can ask for an extension for a public comment period and for a local hearing for a permit,” Lepore said.

In addition, the COGCC has created another tool called the local government/operator agreement. Operators are usually willing to work with a local government to resolve conflicts if they can, including additional sampling of air or water.

“The agreements have been a key way for local governments to address local issues without intruding on the state’s jurisdiction.”

Although the number of unconventional drilled and fractured wells in U.K. is less than in the U.S. the techniques have garnered controversy, according to speaker Claire Bond of Scotland’s University of Aberdeen.

“In the U.K., 200 wells were fracked and they were mainly thermal, gas hydrates and unconventional hydrogen wells in Scotland’s Midland Valley and the Bowland and Weald basins in England. In 2008, there were 97 onshore licenses granted in shale gas areas. In 2011 it suddenly came on the radar when there was a fracked well, Preese Hall-1, in Lancashire. In April, a tremor measuring 2.3 on the Richter scale was felt in the seaside resort, followed by an event in May that measured 1.5. After the seismic events, there was a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing.”

Her study on public perceptions of local and global horizontal drilling and fracturing revealed mixed results from residents. “There was a lot of debate about the pros and cons of shale gas. The ‘bad’ was about earthquakes and pollution and global climate change. Benefits that residents noted ranged from more jobs, to sharing of mineral resource profits, to the country’s energy security.”

After the induced seismic at the Preese-Hall well, the government and other organizations began tracking people’s awareness and public opinion. “When the survey began, about 43% of people had an awareness of shale gas, and it was up to 75% in March 2014 mostly due to media coverage.”

“We also found that the perceived risk is pretty acceptable in terms of exploration. We also found that the kind of language we used could cause biased opinions and that it was important for the energy community to be able to effectively communicate the science behind the application.”

Edith Allison, director of AAPG's Geoscience and Energy Policy Office in Washington, D.C., worked with resolving disagreements between the Obama administration and Congress.

“The Obama administration wants an ‘all of the above policy’ for energy, while at the same time being focused on climate change and reducing greenhouse gases and improving weather resilience to our infrastructure. Congress is interested in encouraging new energy production and creating new infrastructure,” she said.

According to Allison, one of the pieces under way is HR 1806, the America COMPETES Act of 2014. The act is intended to encourage additional research to increase American competitiveness. “The current bill looks primarily at the National Science Foundation research, but it has significant cuts to geoscience funding.”

Other legislation under way are four bills that are called the ‘frack pack’ bills. Allison said that the series of laws “would remove the exemptions that hydraulic fracturing receives with regard to the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Clean Water Act. The bill would make the Federal government be in charge of regulating and monitoring fracturing instead of the states.”