Annual report evaluates progress and sets a vision for the future following the implementation of newly adopted Cumulative Impact rules
Denver, CO (May 15, 2025) - The Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission (ECMC) announces the release of the 2024 Cumulative Impacts Report. Cumulative impacts refer to the combined effects on public health and the environment from the incremental impacts of a proposed oil and gas operation, alongside those from past, present, and reasonably foreseeable future developments.
In compliance with state legislation passed in 2021, the annual Cumulative Impacts Report analyzes the effects of permitted oil and gas operations across a variety of factors, including air quality, water quality, wildlife and communities. Leading a collaborative effort among state agencies, ECMC’s expert staff uses the data it collects from operators to write the report and paint a picture of the impacts of oil and gas operations within Colorado. The report demonstrates ECMC’s ongoing mission to protect public health, safety, welfare, the environment and wildlife resources by providing data that drives science-backed regulations and promotes government transparency.
The report follows substantial newly adopted rules, known as the Cumulative Impacts and Enhanced Systems and Practice Rules. Those rules reflect the nation’s first oil and gas regulations specifically and singularly focused on the evaluation and addressing of cumulative impacts. Because the rules went into effect Dec. 15, 2024, they do not apply to data captured in the 2024 Cumulative Impacts Report, but they will greatly shape operations and data reported in subsequent reports beginning with the 2025 Cumulative Impacts Report that is slated to be published in May 2026. The new rules include updated permitting requirements for operators, the adoption of “enhanced systems and practices” to reduce emissions, new mandatory and comprehensive analyses of cumulative impacts, and novel regulations requiring operators to facilitate public outreach.
“We are incredibly excited about what is to come,” said Jeff Robbins, Chair. “Following the transformation of our mission in 2019, years of work went into a new approach that seeks to adequately evaluate and address the cumulative impacts of oil and gas operations and guide our state toward a sustainable future. Looking forward, operators will take up new and robust practices that will further protect public and environmental health and create a proactive, participatory relationship between the public and operators that’s unique to Colorado.”
Based on science-based findings, the report makes several recommendations to improve ECMC’s operations. These include: expanding collaboration with Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the Air Pollution Control Division of CDPHE; exploring ways to ensure regulatory processes can fairly accommodate new technologies to aid the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions; and continuing to focus on avoiding the siting of oil and gas locations near residential buildings during the planning and consideration of applications, especially those within or near Disproportionately Impacted (DI) communities.
Read the full report. Key takeaways include:
- The Commission approved 58 oil and gas development plans (OGDPs) in 2024. Though this is an increase of about 20 percent over the previous two years, it is a 74 percent decrease relative to the 2016-2018 timeframe.
- The report affirms that greenhouse gas emissions from the oil and gas sector are projected to achieve, and perhaps exceed, the 2025 and 2030 goals laid out by the Air Pollution Control Division (APCD) of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) in Colorado’s Greenhouse Gas Pollution Reduction Roadmap 2.0.
- Approval of oil and gas sites within DI communities increased from 18% in 2023 to 31% in 2024. This increase was largely due to a change in the statewide definition of a DI community, which significantly expanded the area of Colorado defined as DI communities. The average distance between approved sites and homes in DI communities has increased consistently since 2021, from an average distance of less than 1,000 feet in 2021 to an average distance of 4,577 feet in 2024. In addition, ECMC’s new Cumulative Impacts and Enhanced Systems and Practices Rules added new, stronger protections for DI communities.
- ECMC anticipates positive trends in the future related to the increased use of recycled water in oil and gas development based on both the newly implemented Cumulatives Impacts rules and the newly adopted Produced Water rules. (HB23-1242 directed ECMC to adopt rules that require an iterative and consistent increase in the use of recycled or reused produced water without increasing emissions associated with oil and gas operations in each oil and gas production basin. The rules went into effect this spring and initial data will be included in the 2025 Cumulative Impact report.)
- The report also noted a tradeoff, in which approved sites seemed to be moving away from areas near residential buildings, but generally nearer to or within high priority habitats for wildlife. Nonetheless approved sites maintain compliance with the agency’s High Priority Habitat rules.
“In several respects, we are seeing ECMC’s regulations at work, delivering positive trends toward meeting statewide goals for emissions,” said Sabrina Trask, Cumulative Impacts and Energy Transition Manager. “However, there are still areas where the commission’s regulatory authority can usher in new frameworks that will help mitigate harmful impacts to our natural resources, ecosystems and communities.”
About the ECMC
The mission of the Colorado Energy & Carbon Management Commission (ECMC) is to regulate the development and production of the natural resources of oil and gas, deep geothermal resources, the capture and sequestration of carbon, and the underground storage of natural gas in a manner that protects public health, safety, welfare, the environment and wildlife resources. Visit the ECMC website for more information.