Anadarko Petroleum Corp. and Noble Energy Inc., Colorado’s largest oil producers, are waging a media campaign to promote the benefits of hydraulic fracturing as residents push statewide measures to restrict the drilling technique as a threat to the environment.
“It’s all eyes on Colorado,” said Jon Haubert, a spokesman for Coloradans for Responsible Energy Development, created by the energy companies to answer critics of fracking, which uses pressurized water, chemicals and sand to break rock formations. “The oil and gas industry hasn’t done a good job of explaining fracking.”
The state title board Wednesday reviewed some of at least 19 versions of citizen-brought ballot initiatives, some that would allow communities to prohibit fracking or require larger buffers between wells and residences. Organizers will need to get at least 86,000 signatures for each initiative to make it to the November ballot. Signatures will not be collected for all of them.
Anadarko and Noble are buying ads after CRED spent $1 million on television time in the fourth quarter, according to New York-based Nielsen Media Research. They’ve produced six TV commercials, two special sections in The Denver Post and advertorial content on the newspaper’s website,
and paid for radio ads and websites.
The campaign is directed at lawmakers as much as it is at residents, said Amy Mall, a senior policy analyst at the New York-based Natural Resources Defense Council.
Anadarko and Noble, which collaborated with the Environmental Defense Fund to develop groundbreaking controls on emissions from oil and natural-gas operations in Colorado, are attempting to hold back discontent with fracking by spending millions.
“This is a multimillion-dollar effort; there’s no question about that,” Anadarko spokesman John Christiansen said, without providing figures.
CRED has support from some of the state’s most widely recognized figures, including former Govs. Roy Romer, a Democrat, and Bill Owens, a Republican, who serve on its advisory committee.
The energy companies also formed a political group known as an issue committee that raised $2 million through the end of March and has reserved television time close to the election, Haubert said.
