Aspen Daily News: "Two nearby natural areas are among 17 across the West dubbed 'too wild to drill' in a report released on Wednesday by the environmental group The Wilderness Society. The Roan Plateau and another area that includes part of the White River National Forest called Clear Fork Divide were included in the report, which also lists well-known natural spots considered for oil and gas drilling, including Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and Wyoming's Red Desert. Five of the 17 places identified in the report are in Colorado. The 'Too Wild to Drill' report warns that city watersheds, wildlife habitat, roadless lands and potential wilderness areas are being threatened as the region experiences a surge in energy production. It criticizes the Bush administration for the pace and scale of energy development and its impacts on remote areas. 'Our national energy policy is like 'Thelma and Louise.' It's pedal to the metal right off the cliff, and it's dragging our sustainable quality of life with it," said Sloan Shoemaker, of the Carbondale-based Wilderness Workshop. "Folks around here are saying, 'Enough.' We want something left after the boom goes bust and won't stand by watching as these last best places, like the Clear Fork Divide, are plundered for a few hours of energy.'[...]
"The Colorado places the report says are threatened by drilling are: The Roan Plateau - A vast mesa rising northwest of Rifle, home to wildlife, rare plants and native cutthroat trout, which sits on top of what is believed to be a rich supply of natural gas. The BLM has released a plan that would allow gas drilling in phases in an effort to reduce the impact, but environmentalists say the plan doesn't go far enough; The Clear Fork Divide - A roadless area on the fringe of the White River National Forest that connects the Crystal and Colorado River valleys, an area environmentalists say is a key migration corridor that hosts a vast aspen grove and old-growth spruce; Grand Mesa Slopes - Flanks of the Grand Mesa that make up the watershed for Grand Junction and Palisade; Vermillion Basin - A proposed northwest Colorado wilderness area, with rare plants and petroglyphs, ringed by oil and gas leasing; HD Mountains - A roadless area near Durango with what environmentalists say are the largest remaining stands of old-growth ponderosa pine in the Southern Rockies."
Meanwhile, here's an article about the report from the Rocky Mountain News. They write, "Drilling rigs that dot the Rocky Mountain landscape could fill in even more dramatically based on the number of approvals by the federal government. The Bush administration has nearly 119,000 new oil and gas wells on the books for public lands in Colorado, Utah, Montana, Wyoming and New Mexico over the next two decades. That's nearly double the current 63,000 producing wells on public lands in those five states. Colorado alone could see nearly 23,000 new wells in the next 10 to 20 years, more than five times the current 4,200 producing wells on public lands in the state, according to a report released Wednesday."
"2008 pres"
6:01:00 AM 
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