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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAir Quality Advisory Board - Minutes - 12/13/2021 AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR Monday, December 13, 2021 5:30 – 8:00 pm via Zoom 12/13/21 – MINUTES Page 1 1. CALL TO ORDER 5:32pm 2. ROLL CALL • List of Board Members Present − Matt Tribby - chair − Karen Artell − Emily Bitler − Wayne Chuang − Jason Miller − Dan Welsh − Greg Clark • List of Board Members Absent – Excused or Unexcused; if no contact with Chair has been made − Jim Dennison • List of Staff Members Present − Cassie Archuleta, Staff Liaison • List of Guests − Mark Houdashelt 3. AGENDA REVIEW 4. PUBLIC PARTICIPATION a. Mark Houdashelt was previously on the AQAB board and has applied to join the board in 2022. 5. APPROVAL OF MINUTES a. Dan moved and Emily seconded a motion to approve the November AQAB minutes as amended. Motion passed unanimously 8-0-0 6. PREVIOUS BUSINESS a. Monitoring Plan Updates AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 12/13/21 – MINUTES Page 2 − Cassie provided a summary of several current monitoring activities and opportunities that City and County staff are involved with: − EPA has put out an RFP for use of ARPA money for community-driven air quality monitoring effort. City staff is beginning to explore how to pursue that grant opportunity, − Regarding monitoring of air toxics, some items that could be included in the research are regional characterization of oil and gas emissions, and fence line monitoring of oil and gas. There will also be outreach to the community on this. Early in 2022 Cassie will engage the AQAB to discuss the strategy around pursuing this grant. − There is a grant-funded effort involving the City and County of Denver who want to use Fort Collins as a platform, along with Poudre School District, to have sensor technology monitors at schools. − CSU has been awarded grant funding for an air quality study with monitoring and messaging efforts aimed at becoming a "smoke ready" community. − The CDPHE has requested more regulatory monitors through ARPA funding. The City has made a pitch to them to move the downtown regulatory monitor to a more appropriate location on the east side of town. − Staff is also investigating how to spend the $100,000 recently approved by Council for air quality monitoring. Cassie is convening some of the stakeholders to develop a plan and will present it to the community for input. − Discussion − Matt - There will be many opportunities for more robust monitoring locally and regionally. The non-attainment area boundary is poised to be moved northward and will cover more oil and gas operations in Weld County. This would give us an opportunity to also collaborate with Weld County. − Q - Will any of these projects be implemented in 2022? A - Some of them will probably begin in 2022, especially the grant-funded ones that have a timeline. Working with Poudre School District may depend on their work load and may include monitors at City locations instead. b. Interim Chair vote AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 12/13/21 – MINUTES Page 3 − AQAB Chair, Matt Tribby's term is up at the end of December. He will not return to the board in 2022. Therefore, an Interim Chair needed to be appointed from January to March, 2022, at which time a permanent Chair will be appointed. − Karen Artell was nominated to be interim Chair. The board unanimously voted in favor. 7. NEW BUSINESS a. AQAB recommendations related to AQAB 2021 Work Plan − Matt and Wayne briefed the group on the presentation they made to Councilmember Pignataro regarding the main topics on the 2022 AQAB work plan. As follow-up, Cassie will put together a memo with the presentation slides that documents the presentation and will share it with the entire Council. − Oil and gas - Councilperson Pignataro's said these issues are top of mind for her and she takes the AQAB's recommendations seriously. She is also open to future dialogue on this issue. Her position on this is to take aggressive action towards oil and gas production issues. − Electric Vehicles - Councilperson Pignataro understands the gap between where we are today and where we need to be regarding electric vehicles as a method to reduce air quality pollution and also the limited resources the City has to spend on this. She understands the potential funding that is out there to assist the City with increasing EV presence in Fort Collins. − Reducing carbon footprints from buildings - time was short to fully present this topic. − Councilperson Pignataro said she really values the recommendations from the AQAB. Matt sees an opportunity for the AQAB to be a leader for Council as policies are developed around air quality. b. Finalize 2022 AQAB Work Plan − The board reviewed and finalized their 2022 work plan. − Greg moved and Dan seconded a motion to finalize the 2022 AQAB work plan as finalized at the meeting - Motion approved unanimously 8-0-0 8. BOARD MEMBER REPORTS AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 12/13/21 – MINUTES Page 4 a. Matt pointed out that there was a recent newspaper article about Prospect Energy having aerosol leakage at their facility. They are being investigated for not being in compliance with state regulations. − Q - Can an applicant's track record can be considered when their new applications are being reviewed? A - Maybe. The City is discussing how past compliance issues might affects permit approvals and also ownership transactions. − Q -Were the leaks all liquid? Do you know what the root causes were? A - No. They were gas leaks. It seems the patching of their older technology was not working. − Q - How many of Prospect Energy's recompletion requested wells are actually in Fort Collins? A - None. But one of them is in the City's Growth Management Area. − Q - Citizens have described a rotten egg smell coming from the wells, including Hearthfire. Perhaps hydrogen sulfide also needs to be checked as a pollutant. However, an air monitoring camera cannot detect it. A - The proposal for fence line monitoring would be able to detect the source of that odor, which may also be associated with a nearby pond. − Q – It is frustrating that a citizen who had adverse health conditions from the Prospect Energy well had to go to great lengths to have his voice and concerns heard. What avenues are there within the City for public complaints and to have the complaints be acknowledged and given feedback for possible actions by the City? A - This is something the AQAB can weigh in on as the City develops its oil and gas regulations. One question is, since the state of Colorado has oil and gas regulations, does the City need to have redundant regulations within the City and how would that be resourced? We will need to work with the county and the state to determine whether the City can be a liaison for local complaints. − Q - Can the City ask for operators who obtain licenses within the City to pay for independent monitoring of their sites? A - We may be able to do that for new sites, but not for existing operations. − This article was very damaging to Prospect Energy's reputation. There needs to be improvement in how these types of complaints are handled in the future and how the emissions are controlled. − The fine that Prospect Energy had to pay for the previous violation was not very much. Recent legislation has increased those fines quite a bit. AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 12/13/21 – MINUTES Page 5 − The Air Pollution Control Division's website is very difficult to navigate. There are efforts to improve it for increased transparency to the public to help decrease public frustrations on where to find information. 9. OTHER BUSINESS a. Planning calendar − January - finalize annual report, new member introductions, 2022 work plan and review issue index/agenda planning − February - AQ monitoring open house discussion, oil and gas update − March - Climate inventory update, Active Models Plan 10. ADJOURNMENT − The meeting was adjourned at 8:09 pm.