Erie's Getting Drilled

Some Erie residents are miffed that a 100-ft gas well drill has been set up across the street from their neighborhood and is operating 24 hours a day. However there's nothing illegal happening, nor is it completely unexpected. Encana Oil and Gas owns the mineral rights to a 131,000 sq ft parcel within a 35-acre patch, and is drilling two wells here.

Here's what to watch for: In Encana's application narrative submitted to Erie before the operations began, they said drilling at each site would last 7 - 9 days. Following this first procedure, a smaller drilling effort will commence and then a third phase will cap the wells. Given that they've already said they would be done in 20 days to the Longmont Times Call on Nov 7, and they started drilling before that, the drilling will be completed by Thanksgiving.

I'll bet a big ol' turkey leg that rig is there past the predicted timeline.

In a similar vein, I wrote about how mineral rights are the little known secret attributes of many communities' open space holdings in my January Yellow Scene article.