Article by PBI-Canada
On June 24, the Colombian news website La Silla Vacía posted this feature article (in Spanish) titled: Fracking advances in quarantine.
That article notes: “The norms that will regulate the operation of the pilot fracking projects are progressing at a good pace in the ministries of Mines and Environment and in the National Hydrocarbons Agency.”
It adds: “This month, these entities published for comment drafts of regulatory technical, contractual and environmental regulations to start with these pilots.”
“But both the content of the projects, as well as the fact that they have been published in the midst of the pandemic, when communities in the project’s areas of influence are quarantined and have difficulties accessing the internet to find out and send observations, have generated the rejection of the members of the antifracking movement who are preparing a legal and media strategy to slow the progress of this regulation.”
“According to what the member of the Alliance [for a Colombia Free of Fracking], Carlos Andrés Santiago, confirmed to us, although from the movement they have several objections against specific aspects of the regulation under discussion, they did not send comments to the resolutions that came out mainly because ‘we do not believe in good fracking with greater environmental or technical standards. Our proposal is to prohibit it, from there we do not move’.”
“In addition, Santiago told us that these spaces are not legitimate because they limit participation and exclude people from areas of influence that do not have the internet and that the arguments against the regulation will leave them for possible legal actions that they are studying.”
“And the antifracking movement has its main motivation to stop fracking, since they consider that the environmental risk does not justify even developing pilots.”
“According to Santiago, the objective is to stop the advance of the fracking pilots at least until the elections of 2022, with the expectation that an alternative president will win and finally stop this activity.”
The article also notes that the draft regulations state: “The projects will be carried out in the basins of the Middle Magdalena Valley (in the area of influence of Barrancabermeja) and Cesar Ranchería (in the south of Cesar and in the vicinity of La Loma).”
Furthermore: “That companies that already have exploration contracts in unconventional fields (those exploited with fracking) would have priority if they want to propose pilot projects in the areas where they already exist. That would give Ecopetrol, Conoco Phillips, Drummond, Exxon and Parex an advantage (the oil companies that already have unconventional contracts provisionally suspended by the decision of the State Council).”
This suggests that three Canadian oil companies may be bidding for these pilot projects given Parex Resources is a Calgary-based company, while Toronto-based Sintana Energy has partnered with ExxonMobil and Calgary-based Canacol Energy Ltd. has partnered with ConocoPhillips.
Earlier this month, Armando Zamora, the head of national hydrocarbons regulator ANH, stated that the final rules for the fracking pilot projects would be released in July and that the contracts would be awarded in September or October.
