Controversial 'Horizontal Fracking' Remains Legal in Idaho

Controversial 'Horizontal Fracking' Remains Legal in Idaho

Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
by Rocky Barker, The Idaho Statesman, Boise

Though the only natural gas drilling company active in Idaho today has no plans to employ a method blamed around the country for polluting drinking water, industry officials say other companies could one day.

That was enough to keep Gov. Butch Otter and the other state elected officials who make up the Idaho Oil and Gas Conservation Commission from banning the practice Tuesday.

Bridge Resources, the Canadian-based exploratory company that has discovered natural gas in Payette County, said it only will use a "mini-fracking" procedure to stimulate flows of some of its wells.

But David Hawk, representing Snake River Oil and Gas, a subsidiary of Weiser-Brown, another exploration company, pointed to the Chainman Shale formation in Nevada, which has already gained interest from oil and gas explorers and may extend into Idaho.

"People are looking at southern Idaho," Hawk said. "I'd hate to forestall anything."

The commission approved temporary rules Tuesday that allow Bridge Resources to become the first natural gas driller in the state.

Idaho Conservation League Program Director Justin Hayes offered several amendments he said would protect groundwater. One would prohibit horizontal fracking, where fluids are pumped into shale formations at high pressure to allow natural gas to permeate through for recovery.

"Let's just keep those doors closed," Hayes said.

Bridge would inject only vertically, at high pressure, a mixture of gel and sand into the sandstone formation where the company has found gas to clean out the reservoir near the well bore. This process props open fractures and entices gas to flow more freely.

Hayes wanted drillers to ensure their liquids were not carcinogenic and were not a threat to children. Kim Parsons, Bridge Resources' explorations manager, said the rules as written and the company's own practices will ensure its very limited fracking poses no threat to groundwater.

An impermeable shale formation lies between the drill head area, where the fracking will take place thousands of feet below the surface, and the groundwater closer to the surface.

Parsons said other industries on the surface -- such as agriculture -- use far more dangerous compounds that have far more opportunities to leach into the groundwater.

"We invite the rest of industry to come up to our level of groundwater protection," Parsons said.

The commission, made up of Gov. Butch Otter, Secretary of State Ben Ysursa, Attorney General Lawrence Wasden, state schools chief Tom Luna and State Controller Donna Jones, voted unanimously for the temporary fracking rules. Over the summer, the Idaho Department of Lands will hold a series of meetings to develop permanent rules.

Bridge Resources and its partner, Paramax Resources Ltd., both of Canada, have drilled 11 wells in Payette County. Three of the 11 wells can produce at economic levels naturally. Four require stimulation through fracking, officials said. The other four were dry.

Bridge officials said they could go into production before the end of 2011. That could mean money for schools from state land royalties and for other programs from state severance taxes.