Brandon Brown: Sunlight Long Aurora Fracking Plan is Wrong for Colorado
There are bad ideas, and then there are disaster-in-the-making development proposals like Civitas' "Sunlight-Long" application to drill a 35-acre industrial fracking complex directly next to one of Aurora’s primary drinking-water sources: Aurora Reservoir. This week, Governor Polis' Energy and Carbon Management Commission (ECMC) will rule on the permit for this oil and gas project, which would cluster over 30 fracking wells on state land perilously close to the reservoir. The community’s surrounding schools and neighborhoods are also nestled within one mile of the proposed Sunlight-Long fracking mega-pad, more aptly termed "Sunlight-Wrong." This proposal is the kind of short-sighted gamble that hands future generations a healthcare bill and a potential environmental catastrophe they did not ask for and do not deserve. Our Colorado communities deserve better.
Let’s be clear about what’s being proposed. This is not a single well tucked away in a remote, desolate canyon. State and county permit applications show this project as just one part of the massive Lowry Ranch Comprehensive Area Plan (CAP) for over 160 oil and gas wells stretching across state land, which was given preliminary approval by the ECMC in August 2024. The Sunlight-Long fracking pad would sit less than a mile from the Aurora Reservoir, Aurora’s primary water supply and recreational resource. Also within that proximity are neighborhoods, community centers and two elementary schools. The adjacent neighborhoods are filled with children and young parents pursuing their dream of a family-centric lifestyle within the esteemed Cherry Creek School District who now must face the daunting prospect of living half a mile from a massive, polluting, noisy oil and gas fracking site which poses a direct risk to community safety.
Here’s why that proximity matters: recent peer-reviewed research published by the Colorado School of Public Health at CU-Anschutz show that living near oil and gas fracking operations is correlated with serious adverse health impacts, including increased risk of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia. This is not ideological jargon; it is the finding of a groundbreaking CU-Anschutz study adding another boulder to the mountain of evidence that communities near heavy oil and gas development are bearing the brunt of measurable health burdens. (https://news.cuanschutz.edu/coloradosph/oilgas-study-lisa)
Water is the most obvious and unforgiving vulnerability here. Federal and state data put typical per-well fracking water use in the range between 10 to 50 million gallons; with recent years' average volume per well trending upward as laterals have lengthened and operations intensified. (https://ecocarto.com/2025/08/fracking-water-consumption-per-well-has-quadrupled) That water must be sourced, trucked, stored, and managed. Spills, leaks, improper containment, and failures in wastewater handling are not hypothetical. When you place an industrial operation next to a municipal water source, you increase the pathways by which contamination can reach drinking water. The consequences of failure are intolerable and the risks escalate as the proximity to water sources and residential areas increases.
Concerned Aurorans have repeatedly expressed their opposition to the scale and placement of this project, which entails thousands of truck trips, industrial lighting and noise pollution, continual emissions of hazardous air pollutants, as well as water pollution, all occurring in a residential community where both surface and subsurface hydrology are connected to Aurora’s primary water system. Community groups and local voices note that the proposal envisions drilling horizontally beneath the larger Lowry Ranch area, including under or near the reservoir’s watershed. Why would state and local governments allow the industry to concentrate risk under the vital resource Aurora depends on for drinking water and recreation? The only plausible answers are short-term tax revenue and industry appeasement. We must let our elected officials know that neither justifies endangering the Aurora reservoir and communities. (https://savetheaurorareservoir.org/massive-oil-gas-project-near-aurora-reservoir-sparks-outcry)
Fracking industry proponents will offer blanket reassurances: modern technology, regulatory safeguards, monitoring, mitigation. Those are not guaranteed. Modern methods may reduce risk. They do not eliminate it. Regulations work when they are strict, enforced, and backed by independent monitoring; not when industry proponents skew the risk and regulators treat the industry's promises as sufficient. The history of oil and gas operations in Colorado shows routine spill incidents, well failures, destructive explosions, and fugitive emissions all directly causing negative impacts to public health and community safety. We do not get a “do over” if our water is compromised. There can never be enough contingency plans to undo poisoned aquifers from fracking failures, or to un-breathe air laced with the carcinogens, ozone-precursors, and other hazardous air pollutants regularly released from fracking business as usual.
This is a question of priorities for our state regulators. Colorado is facing real, long-term climate and water pressures that impact public health. Using tens of millions of gallons of local water for fracking wells to produce fossil fuels that further accelerate climate change is a poor deal when that same water is needed to support households, agriculture, recreation, and ecosystem resiliency. Even if industry proponents argue fracking uses only a small share of statewide water in aggregate, local impacts aren’t alleviated: severe public health and community safety risk to a major reservoir that serves thousands of local residents right here in Aurora, Colorado.
The best practice is straightforward. Regulators at the ECMC and our elected officials must reject Sunlight-Long outright and direct future development planning toward genuinely low-risk, community-compatible just energy transition locations. The future costs of cleaning our water, treating chronic pollution-related illness, and rebuilding community trust dwarfs any benefits the fracking industry proponents may present. Coloradans are not willing to mortgage community health for a quick boost to the fracking industry’s balance sheet. The time is now to speak out to save the Aurora Reservoir and stop the approval of Sunlight-Long.
Coloradans can, and should, expect more than hollow platitudes. We expect our public reservoirs to stay public and clean. We expect policies that prioritize long-term community health and safety over short-term resource extraction. If the ECMC approves the Sunlight-Long permit in anything resembling its current form, that expectation will have been broken.
Sunlight Long is Sunlight Wrong for Colorado.
Reject it before our communities, our health, our water, and our futures suffer the costs.
Respectfully,
Brandon Brown
Principal Consultant, Sustainable Geospatial
On behalf of Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR), Colorado Chapter
