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Show DO! waiting for to start oil shaSe (Special to the Vernal Express) By HeleneC. Monberg Washington The Administration is waiting for the confirmation of former Colorado State House Speaker Bob Burford to be director of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) before it launches a new oil shale leasing program. Shortly after Burford is confirmed, Jim Black, resources assistant to Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, is likely to be named the state director for BLM in Utah, according to the oil shale pipeline here. With Burford, from Grand Junction, pushing oil shale development from Washington and with Black, a Moab geologist, pushing it from the Utah state BLM office in Salt Lake City. Interior's oil shale leasing program will actually get off the ground, Interior and Capitol Hill sources say. "The test lease program that the Carter Administration was tinkering with is out with the Reagan Administration," Ad-ministration," an Administration Interior-Department watcher told this correspondent on March 27. "Look for a permanent leasing program." Meanwhile, Rep. Dan Marriott, R-Utah, R-Utah, is paving the way for off-tract leasing, if necessary, to develop oil shale tracts leased by the Interior Department. He introduced on March 25 a bill which retains the 5,120 acres as the standard size of a federal oil shale lease but allows the Secretary of Interior In-terior to increase the size if he determines deter-mines a larger area is required to permit long-term commercial operations. A strict limitation on size of lease "could hinder ' oil shale development," Marriott stated, particularly par-ticularly on the more marginal tracts. Other provisions of his bill, Marriott stated, "increase the number of oil shale leases which one person, corporation cor-poration of association may hold from the current limit of one to two leases per state and four nation-wide; 1 authorizes the Secretary of Interior to lease additional acreage to avoid the bypass of small acreages-of oil shale reserves, and authorizes the Secretary of Interior to permit an oil shale lessee to mine other minerals within the oil shale lease tracts," under ' such" conditions con-ditions as he hiay;r&cMbe':'TVIarffo1it predicted his bill would "clear the way" for the introduction of "a permanent per-manent program" for oil shale leasing. Mrs. Dorothy Harvey, speaking for the Citizens for a Responsible Central Utah Project, with headquaeters in Salt Lake City, told the Senate and House Appropriations Committees this past week it is foolhardy to go ahead with the Bonneville Unit of the Central Utah Project diverting Utah water out of the Colorado River and its contributing Uintah Basin. She said her group felt "we cannot support a water develop ment project which removes some 60.000 acre-feet of water from the Uintah Basin-Colorado River sources where oil shale development is underway" un-derway" in Eastern Utah "and required sizable quantites of water." Cost of the Bonneville Unit of the Central Utah Project has ballooned so high that ordinary citizens can't pay for the water unless the government heavily subsidizes its cost, she stated. Sen. Gary Hart, D-Colo., told the same Appropriations Committee this past week federal development of water projects should continue in the Colorado River BAsin, particularly in Colorado because of oil shale development. Hart told a Denver energy meeting on oil shale on March 23 a "balanced approach" is needed to oil shale development, including the proper level of production, leasing federal lands, water , supply projects, environmental en-vironmental protection, community impact assistance, and a new state-federal state-federal partnership on oil shale policy. He advocated demonstrating various technologies by 1990 before full-scale development of oil shale takes place. He said the oil shale leasing program should not, be expanded until the demonstrations have showed the best way to proceed. He favored some provisions of new legislation like those in the Marriott bill allowing multi-mineral multi-mineral leasing, allowing current lease holders to lease off-tract land for surfact retorts, spent shale disposal and other non-mining activities. Water for oil shale development could be provided partly by federal investment, partly by industrial investment in-vestment Hart recommended, to assure that multiple-purpose storage is built, not solely for oil shale development develop-ment and processing. He said a "certain percentage" of the water from such projects should be retained for irrigation. Hart also advocated new laws to protect public health and the environment en-vironment in oil shale country in Western Colorado and Eastern Utah, including, but not limited to, Congressional "setting new standards for oil shale strip mines similar to those tofcoal strip1 mines."'"' - He again urged action on his energy impact assistance bill for oil shale . development, as well as for other energy developments. The assistance would go to communities impacted by oil shale and other energy developments. develop-ments. Finally, he recommended that the " Administration's "good neighbor" policy should allow the oil shale states of Colorado and Utah to help make oil shale policy along with the "feds" here, including the Departments of Energy and Interior. |
