Valencia County opens the door to oil, gas exploration — again (NM Nimby's out in force)

The Albuquerque Journal ^ | July 14, 2022 | Matthew Narvaiz and Kevin Robinson-Avila

[CedarDave]

LOS LUNAS — Valencia County commissioners on Thursday approved in a 3-2 vote a measure that opens the door to oil and gas exploration in the county following hours of raucous testimony from some of the more than 150 protesters and supporters who filled the Los Lunas Transportation Center.

The measure authorizes a new “natural resource overlay zone” that allows developers to apply for exploratory surface and subsurface mineral development in the county without changing existing zoning on targeted properties. That could potentially expedite the permitting process to extract natural resources like oil and gas.

More than two dozen people — including members of activist groups Valencia Water Watchers, Youth United for Climate Crisis Action and the K’OWA Collective — voiced concerns and praise during the meeting, which stretched past midnight before commissioners took their vote.

Most spoke in opposition to the proposal, including Norm Gaume, a former water resources manager for the City of Albuquerque and former Interstate Stream Commission director. Gaume said he was opposed to the measure, calling the oil and gas industry “dirty and contaminated.”

But some spoke in support of the overlay zone, including the New Mexico Business Coalition, the Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico, and employees and consultants that work with Yates’ Albuquerque-based oil and gas firm Jalapeño Corp.

“I think that the safe development of oil and gas has already been proven to be directly related to the measurable increase of the average human lifespan and improved quality of life for our human population over the last hundreds of years,” IPANM Executive Director Jim Winchester said, adding that he feared if the ordinance didn’t pass, “that you’re cutting off a bunch of Valencia County residents from tax revenues for schools.”

[CedarDave]

Los Lunas is the community just south of Albuquerque where the residents rely on that dirty oil and gas money to educate their children, support health facilities, provide their heat, put gasoline in their cars, pave their roads and make plastic containers for everyday products and food. But education has not made them smarter as they apparently believe energy is free and comes from rainbows and unicorn farts.

[CedarDave]

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[DIRTYSECRET]

Lateral drilling. Put 4 of those drills on private property inside an airplane hanger. They’ll never know.

[RightOnTheBorder]

LL is suffering from leftists fleeing the ____hole they created in Albuquerque. Large companies such as Facebook and Amazon building in LL or S. ABQ have exacerbated the problem.

[SkyDancer]

Only because Bidet is out of country; as soon as he returns he’ll shut it down.

[rktman]

Or under an industrial laundry facility. 😳🙂

[Seruzawa]

Ecowackos should be legally banned from using or benefiting from any technology that’s tied to fossil fuels.

[LegendHasIt]

Well, that’s nice....

Although I don’t really remember Valencia County being exactly a hotbed of oil and /or gas production. I may sort of vaguely remember seeing a pump operating about 15-20 miles west of Los Lunas decades ago. but I’m not sure of that. It may have been farther west and or farther north, out of Valencia county.

[JPG]

-Youth United for Climate Crisis Action-

Sounds like a loving and fun-filled group of youts!