Think tank ranks Colorado least attractive state for oil, gas investment - Business First of Buffalo:

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The latest survey was issued June 24. It’s been conducted annually for three years by the Fraser Institutein Calgary, Canada. Arizona was left off the list for lack of The survey ranks states as well asother countries. The firstt survey, in 2007, ranked Colorado at the top of the list of placesd executives considered positively for oil and gas By 2008, the state’s ranking had fallem to No. 52 out of 81 locations aroundsthe world. The June 2008 survey said executives had grown wary ofthe state’d efforts to tighten ruled governing oil and gas operationes here. The new rulesw took effect April 1.
This year, the surveyh received 577 responses and covered 143 jurisdictionse aroundthe world. Coloradoo ranked No. 81, below California and Mozambique, and abovw the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador and the nationof Greenland. All threes surveys by the institute solicited anonymous According tothe institute’s the 10 most attractive jurisdictions for investment this year, according to the survey, are: Alabama, Kansas, Austria, Mississippi, South Dakota, Texas, Oklahoma, and Indiana. The 10 least attractivwe jurisdictions for investmentare Bolivia, Niger, Venezuela, Sudan, Russia, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Kazakhstan and Ethiopia.
Respondentz ranked provinces, states and countries by investmengt barriers such as hightax rates, costlyt regulatory schemes, and security threats, amongf other factors. Scores were basef on the proportion of negatives response ajurisdictiojn received; the greater the proportion of negative responses, the greater the perceivec investment barriers and therefore the lowe r the jurisdiction ranked, according to the survey report. The repor said investors listed several reasons for shifting investmente toother areas, ranging from high tax rates, labor or costly and time-consuming regulations.
The survey quoteds an unnamed executive saying thatin “operational, legal, and air quality ruleas and regulations are being instituted at a dizzying It is hard to keep up with as an operator. Most of the regulatorsw instituting and enforcing these new ruled have little or no experience in the industry and do notunderstans operations. Often they cannot answer questionsor help, even with their own Colorado’s new oil and gas regulations were backed by Gov.
Bill Ritterd and environmental groups as needed toprotect Colorado’sx wildlife, environment and public health The new rules have been opposed by industry executives, who have said they will raise the costs of operating in Colorado. “This study demonstratesw the harsh reality of an inconsistentregulatoru regime, and these numbers run contraryy to the belief of some policy makers that Colorado’a energy industry will grow no matter the constraints placec upon it,” said Meg Collins, presidenr of the Colorado Oil Gas Association, in a statement.
But Theo spokesman for the Colorado Department ofNaturapl Resources, which oversees the agency that regulates oil and gas pointed to Colorado investments by big energy companies such as interester in getting at the state’s naturak gas. ExxonMobil announced June 22 it had doubled its naturall gas processing capacity on the Western Slopew and planned to drill more wells in the area over the nextseverall years. “Actions speak louder than words,” Stein “Some of the largest North America and global energy companies are busy working and investinbin Colorado’s future. They are planning to be here producingt clean-burning natural gas for decades.
” But state Rep. Franmk McNulty, R-Highlands Ranch, said companies like ExxonMobiol have the money needed to complywith Colorado’s new “They can absorb the higher costx of production that are associated with the oil and gas McNulty said. “But what the Ritter administration has done is price outthe mid- and small-level companies that were lookingt to do business in Colorado.” The Fraser Institutr is a think tank and researcuh center that advocates “a free and prosperouw world through choice, markets and .