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Regulators’ coming decisions could determine future of carbon capture in Colorado
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State, The Sum & Substance

Regulators’ coming decisions could determine future of carbon capture in Colorado

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Colorado is about to begin setting rules for companies seeking to pump carbon dioxide underground — a new technology that state leaders call necessary to reduce emissions but that business leaders warn won’t come to Colorado if regulations are too strict. Carbon capture occurs when companies pull carbon dioxide from the emissions emanating from industrial sources and then use wells to inject that gas into deep-rock formations, where it can be stored permanently. Some companies also are working to develop direct air capture where the carbon dioxide can be pulled straight from the atmosphere, but that technology remains nascent. Currently, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for permitting carbon-capture projects, but the ...
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Business leaders plead for changes in state’s new AI law, including definitions and appeals
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State, The Sum & Substance

Business leaders plead for changes in state’s new AI law, including definitions and appeals

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Developers and deployers of artificial intelligence systems are begging a legislative task force to amend definitions and an “untenable” appeals process in Colorado’s AI law — and getting pushback from some groups who feel the law doesn’t regulate enough. The push-and-pull has played out for two months before the Artificial Intelligence Task Force, a 26-person group of elected officials and citizens put together by Gov. Jared Polis after he signed “with reservations” the most comprehensive AI regulatory law in America. With the regulations not going into place until February 2026, the task force is hearing from myriad groups affected by them and is required to submit a report to the Joint Technology Committee by February 20...
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New rules would limit use of fresh water in oil-and-gas operations
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State, The Sum & Substance

New rules would limit use of fresh water in oil-and-gas operations

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance To reduce the amount of fresh water used in oil-and-gas drilling, operators must ensure a certain percentage of water they are using in extraction is reused or recycled under a plan set to be released in the next week by a legislatively created advisory group. The strategy from the Colorado Produced Water Consortium — a group of 31 energy, environmental and water experts that has been meeting for more than a year — will mark the first time Colorado has attempted to curb use of fresh water in the industry. Consortium members are required to produce a report with recommendations by Nov. 1, and the Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission is scheduled to hold a hearing in December to put new rules into place. Oil-and-gas companies use ...
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Is end of Colorado Dem’s House supermajority needed for balance on business debates?
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State, The Sum & Substance

Is end of Colorado Dem’s House supermajority needed for balance on business debates?

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance While politicos are focused on eight or nine races to see if Democrats keep their Colorado House supermajority in the Nov. 5 election, maybe the most important thing for business is not the number of seats each party wins so much as the fact there are so many contests. That observation is one offered particularly by Rep. Shannon Bird, a Westminster Democrat who holds significant power as chairwoman of the Joint Budget Committee and who also is a business advocate and one of the most frequent aisle-crossers on economic issues. Bird thinks that Colorado employers already have won — first by the results of June primaries that broke largely to pragmatists in both parties but also by the fact that close races require candidates to knock on doors an...
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Legislators have a business tax-break plan — and opposition to it
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State, The Sum & Substance

Legislators have a business tax-break plan — and opposition to it

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance After considering several options to reduce the business-personal-property tax burden, Colorado legislators appear interested in backing a plan that would nix a rarely used tax break and create a new benefit focused on smaller companies. Late last month, the Legislative Oversight Committee Concerning Tax Policy advanced five proposals to Legislative Council, which will meet next week to determine which of those and of other interim-committee suggestions will be introduced as bills in the 2025 session. And while committee members declined to advance either of two BPPT-specific proposals it earlier had discussed, they did agree to incorporate one of those proposals into an omnibus bill that would make myriad changes to state tax law. ...
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Legislators favor lighter touch to regulating business audits contracted by cities
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State, The Sum & Substance

Legislators favor lighter touch to regulating business audits contracted by cities

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Given the options of taking an aggressive or conservative approach to combatting “trigger audits,” Colorado legislators appear to have chosen the latter. The Sales and Use Tax Simplification Task Force last week unanimously approved a bill for drafting that would require any that any third-party auditors contracted by cities maintain the same confidentiality with collected data that Colorado governments would use. It also will send a letter to the Colorado Department of Revenue calling on it to convene a task force to help increase the number of businesses using the existing SUTS tax-filing system — a change that it believes would boost compliance with state law. READ THE FULL STORY AT THE SUM & SUBSTANCE
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Report on hospital facility fees could stir new health-care regulatory efforts
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State, The Sum & Substance

Report on hospital facility fees could stir new health-care regulatory efforts

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance A legislatively mandated report on hospital-system facility fees that was released Tuesday appears likely to spark a new round of debate on whether the state should limit the fees that opponents call costly and unclear and that hospitals say are vital to offsite operations. The Hospital Facility Fee Report concluded that the fees, added for services in nonacute-care settings, drive up health-care costs by more than $50 million annually, are opaque and confusing and incentivize independent physicians to affiliate with larger hospital systems. However, the report also notes that a reduction in fee revenue could drastically cut the federal matching money that’s been used to expand Medicaid eligibility, and it noted several times that the task for...
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Colorado regulators appear to reach consensus on cumulative-impacts regulations for oil & gas
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State, The Sum & Substance

Colorado regulators appear to reach consensus on cumulative-impacts regulations for oil & gas

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance After four weeks of testimony and debate, Colorado regulators seem to have aligned on new cumulative-impacts rules that will require more protections from oil and gas firms wanting to drill in already impacted areas but will not shut off future projects altogether. The Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission broke Thursday afternoon until Oct. 8 but not before coming to a consensus around how oil-and-gas operators must account for their emissions as part of the cumulative impacts of all industry in an area. Environmental advocates have sought such added considerations for five years to better protect poorer communities that already have higher levels of pollution and industrial activity, and the rules the ECMC is developing ...
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Legislators considering bills to reduce ‘trigger audits’ targeting business
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State, The Sum & Substance

Legislators considering bills to reduce ‘trigger audits’ targeting business

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Multiple medium- to large-sized companies say that they’ve been targeted for audits over and over by groups of a dozen or more municipalities in recent years, typically at the behest of a third-party auditing firm contracted by smaller cities to investigate potential tax scofflaws. It’s not the general concept of the audits that bothers tax professionals and business leaders so much the frequency and number of these audits, as well as the fear that an unregulated company is sharing information from the investigations to spur more audits. The primary company contracting with Colorado cities to perform these audits says it does not share such information, but critics note that the firm — Revenue Recovery Group of Baton Rouge, Louisiana — refuses...
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Deadline looms for packaging producers to register for new state-mandated recycling program
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State, The Sum & Substance

Deadline looms for packaging producers to register for new state-mandated recycling program

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance In just two weeks, any substantially sized company that produces packaging sold within Colorado — from plastic to glass to wood — must be registered with a new industry-led organization that will soon begin charging fees to fund a statewide recycling system. The deadline comes more than two years after the Legislature approved the first-of-its-kind makeup for the funding and administration of the programs, and the deadline has been moved up nine months from what that law originally anticipated. And while the Circular Action Alliance is still working to determine how many companies will be affected by the fee, the watchdog Colorado Consumer Coalition estimates the total could be about 1,500. READ THE FULL STORY AT THE SUM & SUB...
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