carbon capture

Enchant Energy disputes criticisms of carbon capture proposal for coal plant

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Enchant Energy, the company that plans to turn the San Juan Generating Station near Farmington into the world’s largest carbon capture system, responded to criticisms made in a recent report, blasting the proposal. NM Political Report spoke with the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) report author Karl Cates about his concerns for the proposal last month. RELATED: Energy think tank blasts carbon capture proposal for San Juan coal plant

Enchant Energy addressed a number of issues raised by the IEEFA report in a document posted to the company’s website in late July. The company reiterated its belief that the proposed carbon capture system offers a cost-effective, low-emission solution to keep the coal-fired San Juan Generating Station open. “Contrary to the IEEFA assertion, Enchant Energy is not making hard and fast ‘presumptions,’” the company said, pointing to a pre-feasibility study the company commissioned earlier this summer from global engineering firm Sargent & Lundry.

Navajo

Three years after attack, urban Indian population remains vulnerable

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ALBUQUERQUE – With cuts and bruises on his face, back and shoulders, Jerome Eskeets frantically told police about the violent assault he barely survived the night before. In his 30s, Eskeets had been sleeping in an empty lot on Albuquerque’s west side with friends and relations, Allison Gorman and Kee Thompson, who like Eskeets were Dine’, as members of the Navajo Nation call themselves. This story originally appeared at New Mexico In Depth. Soon after talking to Eskeets, police found Gorman’s and Thompson’s bludgeoned bodies. The 2014 crime shocked Albuquerque, the state and occasionally made national news as the cases against the three defendants eventually arrested in the brutal killings — youths Alex Rios, Nathaniel Carrillo and Gilbert Tafoya — worked their way through the court system.

BP

BP pulling jobs, but not wells, from New Mexico

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The oil company BP announced it will close its Farmington, New Mexico office by the end of the year and reduce its in-state workforce by about 40 employees. Other current New Mexico employees will be relocated to the company’s office in Durango, Colorado. In a statement, the company said that move will “help improve the efficiency and competitiveness of its operations in the San Juan Basin.”

The company emphasized in its emailed statement it “has no plans to decrease its overall investment in New Mexico.” Currently, the company operates 2,600 wells in the state and will “seek to drill new wells in New Mexico when feasible.”

Earlier this year, BP announced it will open its new headquarters in Denver next year. In recent years, Colorado has increased regulations for oil and gas drilling within state boundaries. Last week, Gov. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, announced the state’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Abortion Access

Three NM Planned Parenthood clinics to close this year

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Three Planned Parenthood clinics in New Mexico—one in Albuquerque, one in Rio Rancho and one in Farmington—will close by this fall. Whitney Phillips, a spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains, which oversees clinics for the women’s health provider in New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming and Nevada, attributed the closures to “reduced patient volume” and challenges in the healthcare industry. “There’s no secret that the reproductive health landscape right now is tough,” she said, referring to the “defund Planned Parenthood” campaigns from opponents of abortion. None of the three clinics slated to close perform surgical abortions. She also ascribed some of the troubles to the federal Affordable Care Act, which “impacted the way we operated, the way we bill things.” Still, she said Planned Parenthood still supports ACA “because the more people with insurance, the better.”

The coming closures will drop the number of New Mexico Planned Parenthood clinics from six to three by this September.

Navajo Nation

Problems persist at agencies overseeing drilling leases, payments for some Navajo families

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A newly released federal audit points to continued problems in how the federal government manages oil and gas leases and payments for some Navajo families, including in New Mexico. In the 19th century, the federal government deeded some lands within the boundaries of the Navajo Nation to individual families. Families can choose whether or not to allow oil and gas companies to drill on those lands, called “allotments,” which are not overseen by tribal government. Instead, the leases and permits for those wells are handled by the Federal Indian Minerals Office. Based in Farmington, FIMO also oversees royalty payments.

24/7 Wall St.

New Mexico home to fastest-shrinking city in the nation

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With reports that New Mexico has a net-negative job growth, it should perhaps come as no surprise that the fastest-shrinking city in the country is in New Mexico. A report by 24/7 Wall St. found that the Farmington, New Mexico metropolitan statistical area is the fastest-shrinking city in the country. Farmington was the only New Mexico city to land on the list, which tracked cities from 2010 to 2015. According to the report, Farmington has seen its population shrink by 8.8 percent in the last five years. This is more than two percentage points higher than second place, Pine Bluff, Arkansas with 6.38 percent.

Animas River

Toxic threat: Gold King one of thousands of abandoned mines

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FARMINGTON, N.M. – Thousands of abandoned mines in New Mexico, Colorado and other Western states pose as much of a toxic threat, or greater, as the Gold King Mine in Colorado, which leaked three million gallons of toxic sludge and mine waste into the Animas River following an accidental discharge last week. Part of the larger Colorado River system, the Animas is a tributary of the San Juan River, which flows into Lake Powell and mixes with Colorado River water. Farmington is among several downstream communities devastated by the spill. Mike Eisenfeld with the San Juan Citizens Alliance says the Gold King Mine spill is just a sample of the threat posed by century-old abandoned mines. “There’s probably about 20,000 historic, abandoned mines in the Four Corners area,” he says.

News

NASA set to investigate methane in Four Corners

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A group of researchers will look into the causes of  a large methane cloud over the northwest corner of New Mexico, according to an an announcement on Monday from NASA. Christian Frankenberg, a jet propulsion scientist, will be representing NASA in the research. “With all the ground-based and airborne resources that the different groups are bringing to the region, we have the unique chance to unequivocally solve the Four Corners mystery,” Frankenberg said in a statement. Last year, the the Daily Times in Farmington reported on the discovery of a methane cloud that covered 2,500 square miles of the Four Corners area. The measurements show a major bloom of methane gas in the region — approximately 1.32 trillion cubic feet of methane produced or leaked into the atmosphere each year.