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Did you know...
While hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has been in the news in recent years, the tehnology actually was first proposed in the 1940s.
The first viable well in Colorado was drilled in 1969 near Rifle. A 43-kiloton nuclear bomb was detonated nearly 8,500 feet below the surface to develop the well. It was part of the Plowshares Program -- an effort that focused on peaceful use of nuclear energy. Modern fracking doesn't employ bombs.
There's a ballot initiative in Colorado that would require any newly drilled fracking wells be at least 2,500 feet from homes, schools, and water sources. The current setback is 500 feet from homes and 1,000 feet from densely occupied buildings.
Backers says this is the minimum needed to protect people from noxious emissions from well sites.
The industry currently provides tens of thousands of jobs and is in a drilling "boom." Colorado has lived through several oil and gas booms and busts, which can be financially devastating.
Opponents claim if the initiative passes, it will cause jobs and drilling to dry up, regardless of the demand for oil and gas.
Which statement most closely represents how you'd vote?
The initiative passes and new setback laws go into effect. The industry ends up praising the new law because it offers concrete statewide rules, rather than a patchwork of laws differing by city and county.
The initiative fails. Six months later, a home in a development built near a fracking site explodes, killing two people. The investigation finds that a well improperly marked as sealed was damaged during the constrution which caused a gas leak and explosion.
As you're sitting at your kitchen counter in Greeley, Colorado, you notice your morning coffee is moving in the cup. You look up and see the light above you gently swaying.
At first you thought it was from a passing truck, but then you remembered a fracking wastewater injection well was shut down in 2014 after causing small earthquakes.
There's no damage (the quake registered 1.7 on the Richter scale), but this is the first time you've ever experienced an earthquake at home.
A recent study found fluid injected into rocks via fracking can cause pre-existing faults to become "active" -- even if there typically isn't any measurable seismic activity . And University of Colorado researchers found fracking-related earthquake activity is increasing in both Weld County and Southern Coloado. Other studies found similar patterns in Texas and Oklahoma.
Colorado is proposing new legislation dealing with the oil and gas industry and offers this map as a way to illustrate the situation.
What does this map show?
Correct.
Colorado has an estimated 275 "orphaned" wells, or wells abandoned by the industry which need to be cleaned and capped.
Clean up is paid for through the Orphan Well Program, a state agency funded by oil and gas operators through financial assurance, a production levy, and penalty revenues. The red x represents a clean-up in progress and the blue + represents a planned clean-up.
And the federal government also offers additional funding to states to help clean up orphaned wells. Federal wells are represented by an orange triangle.
Map courtesy of Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission
That's it for Colorado!
Head on over to our interactive documentary to learn more about fracking in North Dakota and Texas.
Or continue to play the game to see how fracking works in Pennsylvania. Click on the fracking rig to replay Colorado with different options