Past Press Releases

September 4, 2013
Coalition of Archaeological and Environmental Groups: Save Chaco Canyon from Drilling and Fracking

January 6, 2015
BLM Defers Fracking Near New Mexico's Sacred Chaco Canyon​

May 11, 2015
Groups Seek to Stop Unstudied Chaco Fracking

June 1, 2015
Navajo and Environmental Groups Take the Greater Chaco Fracking Fight to BLM's Farmington Office

August 17, 2015
Judge Fails to Halt Fracking in Greater Chaco

August 18, 2015
More than 165,000 Deliver A Message to New Mexico Politicians: Stop Fracking in the Greater Chaco

June 6, 2016
Obama Administration Pulls Plans for Fracking near Chaco Canyon

July 13, 2016
Community Reacts to San Juan Basin Oil Tank Explosion

September 2, 2016
Thousands Speak out for Climate and Chaco Canyon, Call for Canceling New Mexico Oil and Gas Lease Sale

October 19, 2016

Health, Education, and Human Services Committee receives report regarding concerns with hydraulic fracturing in the Eastern Navajo Agency

Groups who have voiced support against fracking in Greater Chaco

We sent this letter October 11 as our last in a series of requests to engage Udall's leadership in calling for an immediate moratorium to fracking in the Greater Chaco region until the Bureau of Land Management has completed it’s Resource Management Plan amendment process to include a comprehensive health and social impact assessment and a plan for climate protection and just transitions to renewable energy development in the area.

On March 11, 2015 we sent a letter, signed by over 30 organizations calling for an end to fracking in the region, and copied that letter in an ad in the Santa Fe New Mexican.

June 1, 2015, we sent a letter to BLM Farmington Director Victoria Barr, reasserting the needs above;

On August 18, 2015 we delivered over 165,000 petition signatures to Udall's district offices calling for an end to fracking in the Greater Chaco area.

At the April 2016 BLM lease sale, over two hundred New Mexicans protested the oil and gas auction and the mismanagement of the federal oil and gas leasing program. Then, in efforts to avoid future protests, the BLM moved its July sale to Roswell, and is making moving these auctions online nationally.

On September 2 of this year we sent comments from thousands of New Mexicans calling on BLM to rein in unchecked fracking in the area and abandon its plans to auction off nearly 1,000 acres of public lands at the January 18 oil and gas lease sale.