Between two national parks lies a corridor rich in wildlife - but also in fossil fuels. Will protection follow now that the gas extraction drillers want to move in?

It has been called one of North America's wildest places. Just north of the US-Canada border, the wooded slopes of the Canadian Rockies channel unpolluted water into a valley that remains free of human development. Grizzly bears, cougars and wolverines prowl the banks of the Flathead river. Outside of a national park, there is probably no wilderness like it on the continent.

Southern Albertans who treasure the unspoiled qualities of Waterton Lakes National Park may believe the park’s World Heritage Site status serves to protect it from environmental plunder.

But that may not be true if a strip mine and a coalbed methane project both eyed for the Flathead Valley in southeastern B.C. — spitting distance from Lethbridge — are allowed by the B.C. government.

The United Nations has begun an investigation in the wake of outcries from area environmentalists (the matter has even been raised in the U.S. presidential race, with Barack Obama weighing in earlier this month) and could end up listing Waterton-Glacier as a World Heritage Site In Danger.

Oil and gas development in Wyoming has been planned in a "piecemeal" fashion thus far, sometimes on a well-by-well basis, biologists and conservationists argued Friday.

Future, more responsible development calls for a much broader, science-based approach, they said.

Day two of the Responsible Energy Development Symposium, spearheaded by Trout Unlimited, featured presentations and discussions on reducing harm to wildlife and other natural resources, and reclaiming wild habitat during and after drilling and extraction is through.

The three-day gathering at Jackson Lake Lodge has drawn more than 180 participants so far. It concludes today with an all-day field trip to the Jonah and Pinedale Anticline natural gas fields in the Upper Green River Valley.

May 25, 2008 - 4:17PM
By R. SCOTT RAPPOLD
THE GAZETTE
WALSENBURG - Kent Smith hasn't drawn a drop of water from his well in a year.

But the well has produced plenty of methane, an explosive and poisonous gas that, at one point, blasted from his well head with the roar of a car engine.

"When you have water taken away, it changes everything," said Smith, 64, a retired teacher who moved here from Castle Rock to be a self-described "cowboy" and keep horses amid the splendor of the Sangre de Cristo mountains.

On the plus side, the methane alarms installed in the past year in and outside of his house - a red light warns him not to go inside - haven't gone off.

Wildsight and Flathead Coalition Headed to BP AGM in London

British Petroleum is remaining silent. The residents of Fernie aren’t.

On Saturday, nearly 300 residents of Fernie took to the streets to oppose BP and their proposals to drill for coalbed methane (CBM) in southeastern B.C.’s Flathead and Elk Valley. To no surprise, BP representatives were not present.

“This was a farewell party,” says Wildsight Program Manager Casey Brennan. “There have been many chances for BP to participate in public discussion about the fate of our communities. So far, BP has chosen not to be a part.

“We’ll take that silence as confirmation that they know people don’t want them here,” says Brennan.