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Show .Vernal Express Legislative video C2 Wednesday, October 4, 2006 :: ? 11 Continued from CI measure of how much the activity activ-ity we do have. This year we will process or will receivehow much the activity we do have. This year we will process or will receive somewhere in the neighborhood of 1500 APDs. Not only do we have that many now, but the potential exists based on what the companies have told us that are operating in the Basin, that we have the potential to go upwards of 1800 possibly to even 2000 APDs per year. Fortunately when the Energy Policy Act was passed in 2005, Vernal was identified as one of the seven offices in the Bureau that was experiencing experienc-ing a large increase in work load. I think it was a surprise to most folks outside of Utah that Vernal was probably one of the busiest just on sheer numbers, the second busiest office in the Bureau and from a conventional convention-al oil and gas standpoint, which means not including coalbed methane, it is by far and away the busiest. Behunin: When Mr. Stringer says "the busiest" what does that mean? Well natural nat-ural gas production in Uintah County has gone from 65 billion cubic feet in 1999 to 163 billion cubic feet in 2005. Translated to dollars and cents, the natural natu-ral gas industry generated over $1.3 billion in Uintah County in 2005. Diane Batty, Farm Bureau: Hello, my name is Diane Batty and I am the Farm Bureau- president for Uintah County. As most of you know, Uintah County is experiencing a record growth rate, there are homes being built everywhere, and we are losing farm ground fast. Most of the farm ground that is left is in the rural sections sec-tions of our county. It is more important than ever to protect the rights and heritage of the farmers and ranchers in our county. We also support higher education and the Land Grant University System. Specifically the Utah State University Extension mission, and we feel privileged to have the USU Ty tat JUL Milt WW I t ' 'f i ft 4 I M . Ik. OSEC Tcdinok r Resource? Oil shale operation explained during Legislative tour. Extension in our County. The and we want to be able to con-farmers con-farmers and ranchers in Uintah tinue it for our children and County had a vast heritage, for their children. And that is and we a proud of that heritage what Farm Bureau is doing in UfFY KfflTS OG0S & STRUTS II 1 i 1 lj-u-i--i--i. n . . , . , . , . figsssg h niir f j'l III f 1 g m H 0 fjrngBl rrmr? ueJ i J FREE fehicio ChecU-U Brakes Anti Freeze Tires Shocks Struts Belts ' L Mos! vehicles. Participating siOies ory. s;ot voi:.: other offer. Expires 9 1 506 SMALL TRUCKSUV ECONOMY ! I i I p3 i i EachP23575R15 J Visual Inspection Most vehicles. Participating stores on:y. Not vj : i other offer. Expires 9 ! 506 i NO CASH AND CARRY. ALL PRICING EXCLUDES INSTALLATION. USE l2ISSireceive90dayssarneascash! Proud sponsors ui t: ' ... -'vAnwihW i IF 4 Commissioner Mike McKee participates in tour. Uintah County and it is why we are known as the voice of agriculture agri-culture in America. Behunin: For years and years Uintah County was a thriving agricultural center and still is to some great degree, but many of the fields where corn once grew and alfalfa was raised is now being replaced 'with a new crop houses. Unfortunately not everybody can afford the new commodity. Heather Hoyt, Uintah County: Uintah County js suffering suf-fering a severe housing shortage, short-age, and it is much different than it was a couple of years ago. Previously we were able to put people in motels while we helped them search for housing, hous-ing, but now things are different. differ-ent. Uintah County is trying to come up with some creative solutions. We've made a plea to the public. We have asked them to let us know if they have rooms for rent. If they have basement apartments they can rent, and we are being able to match some people up there. We're working with the Housing Authority trying to get some affordable housing built, but that's expensive and it is slow. So as of today we have no place to put people, and it has become a real problem. Behunin: It is true that people peo-ple need places to live, and they also need other critical services like health care, food services and public safety. But in the extraction industry perhaps the most impacted area is roads, and nobody knows these roads better than industry consultant Mr. Bill Ryan. Bill Ryan, industry consultant: con-sultant: Once development starts to occur, we will see blind hills, narrow spots, rough road, mud holes, all of these different differ-ent things that you have probably prob-ably seen at different times, but they really, really slow down the ability to move in the field. Vehicles on these rough roads can only move 10 mph, 15 mph at the most. And if we build these road up, make them a little bit better, we can increase that speed to 20 to 30 miles an hour at a $170 a hour for a lot of these trucks and travel time, what we do is cut that travel cost down. Wear and tear on the equipment decreases. Behunin: Bill is not kidding when he says "these roads are rough." We took a little ride with Bill and found out exactly that. ' Ryan: We are driving down a section of road here now that's typical of where an old road that has been widened and widened. It's incredibly rough. We can't pull maintenance on this section of road because this veneer that on here now if we destroy that then this become one big dust bowL So we've got a rough road. Trucks can only drive five to ten mph down this darn thing. Right now we are at 10 mph. The other problems prob-lems we talked about earlier were the environmental issues. You can see that this road is not crowned and ditched So any water that comes on here create mud holes as we have here on the left hand side. It is sun baked now, but there is no drainage here. The surfacing of this road could be better than just the native material. Now we come down, it narrows down where the trucks can barely meet each other. Not only is it a blind curve, but it is a blind hill at the same time here. Barely enough room for a pickup and a truck to meet, and these roads are now seeing large numbers of big trucks meeting in these kinds of areas. Behunin: And speaking of big trucks. Take a look at this big truck and the great difficulty diffi-culty it is having navigating narrow byways. This is not an unusual occurrence. It happens every single day. But these narrow roads, not only create hazards for drivers and equipment, equip-ment, but there are economic effects as well. Page van Loben sels, president of Earth Energy Resources, explains. Page van Loben sels: The biggest problem that we are facing, one of the major problems prob-lems we are facing there, is the road, the access. We have to go approximately 45 miles on a dirt road. To get there we are going to have to haul all of our oil out on that dirt road, and this is going to result in probably an additional approximate $3 to $4 per barrel of oil cost. This also reduces the royalties we will be paying to SITLA to support the school children here in Utah. It will probably reduce those royalties by anywhere from $100,000 and $500,000 a year. The other effect that it has, is that it affects who works for us out there and where do they come from? If we were able to pave that road and be able to move people in there somewhat more efficiently, we would be able to hire local people. But the local people in this part of the state, are not tremendously excited about going up and living away from home and away from their families, for 10 days in a row on a regular recycled basis. We would, therefore, have undoubtedly undoubt-edly among the workers, transients tran-sients coming from outside the state, coming in to operate our units. We would prefer very much to be a part of the community, com-munity, a part of the Roosevelt, the Vernal community, and have our people be here. We can take vans, get everybody up there and get them back and have them be able to live with their families while they are working for us. ' Behunin: Housing, healthcare, health-care, public safety, roads. These are all impacts familiar to all of us who live in the great state of Utah. And these impacts come to us for various and sundry reasons depending on where we live. Uintah County is not alone in this area of impact. But it is unique because of the extraction extrac-tion industry. (Continued next week) |