Colorado is poised to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to clean up its transportation sector under a deal Democratic Gov. Jared Polis brokered between green groups and the oil sector.
It’s a rare truce in the nationwide battle over energy policy — one that could change the trajectory of Colorado’s climate efforts. The state will levy a new per-barrel production fee, in return for both sides withdrawing competing ballot initiatives that would have asked voters to sharply constrain oil production or, alternatively, unravel a decade of climate policies.
“There are many ways it could have fallen apart,” Polis said in an interview with E&E News. But both environmentalists and oil companies worked through their differences, he said, to avoid a high-stakes gamble at the ballot box.
“Both sides had an interest in doing that, because no one knows what the people of Colorado will do [with a ballot initiative],” Polis said. “It’s a roll of the dice — it’s a costly roll of the dice.”
