Thirty years ago, Herb Bacon was working in the old U.S. Bank of Grand Junction when a man operating Exxon’s local oil shale project walked into the lobby with his usual pep in his step. Little did either man know it then, but two days later–on what is now known as “Black Sunday”–Exxon pulled the plug.
Chevron is giving up its experimental oil shale lease in Western Colorado. The company is one of only three companies holding a federal lease to research oil shale development in Colorado but officials say they would rather pursue other projects.
The Garfield County commissioners reportedly back a scaled-back federal plan for oil shale development in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah, as long as it leaves as much acreage as possible open for exploring and perhaps eventually extracting the still unproven form of fuel.
Republican Doug Lamborn’s bill to speed up oil shale production in western Colorado has been packaged with House Speaker John Boehner’s American Energy and Infrastructure Jobs Act (HR 7) as a means of funding the nation’s crumbling transportation infrastructure. But critics point out commercial oil shale production is potentially decades away and may never come to fruition.
A new Government Accountability Office report (pdf) issued this week concludes that a lot more study of water resources needs to be conducted before there’s a full-blown resurgence of the Colorado’s Western Slope oil shale industry.
Actually, resurgence isn’t…
Wednesday’s move by the Bureau of Land Management to proceed with more oil shale leases for Exxon Mobil and two other companies conjured up memories for some of the “Black Sunday” bust of May 2, 1982, when Exxon laid off 2,200 oil shale workers on Colorado’s Western Slope. But this time will be different, an Exxon spokesman told the Colorado Independent Thursday.
“It’s been 25 years and we’re still here….”
Only a couple of dozen people still living in Rifle can make the claim they survived “Black Sunday,” the day Exxon pulled out of the oil shale business on May 2,…
Colorado Confidential takes a look at oil and gas drilling hearings and legislation and the 25th anniversary of “Black Sunday,” the day Exxon pulled the plug on oil shale development in the Rifle area-May 2nd, 1982.
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