The phrase “pass the buck” is said to have originated in the Old West, when poker players used a Buck knife on the table to indicate the next person to deal the cards. Choose not to deal? Pass the buck to the next person. The phrase stuck. Then Harry Truman made the phrase “the buck stops here” famous as an expression of his dedication to responsibility.

The San Juan Basin is an area rich with coal, oil, and natural gas. There is also a problem for which few had taken responsibility. Methane, a powerful greenhouse gas 25 times more potent that CO2, is being emitted into the atmosphere at alarming levels because of the natural shifting of the Rocky Mountains.

In pre-industrial times, the level of methane in the atmosphere was less than 750 parts per billion. In 1850, the level shot up to 1,800 parts per billion. Today, some measurements in the San Juan Basin reach 5,000 parts per billion. For methane released by the mining and extraction industries, environmental regulations help mitigate the problem. But significant methane is also released naturally from seams of coal near Earth’s surface. Environmental regulations do not address this. Everyone had passed the buck.

Until now. With your support for this project, the Southern Ute Indian tribe, on their reservation of over 1,000 square miles in the San Juan Basin, captures methane emissions from coal beds for use as natural gas. An amazing 280,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions have been eliminated by this project. Why? Because it is the right thing to do, for the land, for the climate, and for our future. The buck stops here.