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Jim Bauder definitely digs his work
From digging underground hideouts as a kid in upstate New York to studying soil cores from eastern Montana, Jim Bauder's chosen work has been about soil and its complex relationship with air and water.
by Carol Flaherty |
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| In this 2005 photo, Jim Bauder sticks his arm down into a crack in the soil in an ephemeral stream channel in northeastern Wyoming that had received coalbed methane water discharge. Photo courtesy of Jim Bauder. |
For nearly 30 years, Bauder has been MSU's Extension soil scientist, a job that for most of that time was not embroiled in controversy. He helped farmers and ranchers keep their soils healthy and productive. He collected baseline data on soils and water. He crisscrossed the state providing information.
But in the early 1990s, his research was pulled into the debate about coalbed methane development.
The issue has huge economic, ecological and political implications. The U.S. Geological Survey estimated in 2002 that Montana and Wyoming's Powder River Basin has more than 14 trillion cubic feet of recoverable methane tucked in its coalbeds. Although methane drilling supplies only about 7 percent of the United States' natural gas, that still translates to a multi-billion dollar potential.
When Bauder's research data pointed to soil quality changes due to salts in irrigation water, it put him in the middle of the controversy, because coalbed methane mining can add mineral salts to drainage areas and river systems. On a memorable day in Billings, while being interviewed on National Public Radio, one caller branded him a terrorist, implying that Bauder's stance thwarted domestic energy development.
"Audiences have specific places they would like to see the science fit," Bauder said. "Science doesn't always work that way."
As Bauder describes it, science reveals a continuum that goes "from the atmosphere, into the soil, and through the soil into the streams and groundwater."
That's why he is identified as closely with Montana water quality as he is with soil management. As one of the nation's leading experts on coalbed methane mining water's effects on soil, his data has helped inform the debate.
"Jim is a really remarkable scientist," said Art Compton, administrator of the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. "I say that because he, as much as any person working in the field, is determined to shine the light of good science on what is very often a polarizing and very controversial area." Compton added that Bauder's work "has very much illuminated how to best protect agricultural uses," but that Bauder also works with landowners who see coalbed methane development as inevitable and an opportunity.
Glenn Gay is one of those landowners. A rancher near Broadus, Gay began working with Bauder in the 1990s on Powder River irrigation water issues. Now, as he contemplates the likelihood of coalbed methane development on his own ranch, years of working with Bauder are paying off.
"With Jim's help and knowledge, I think CBM and ranching are very compatible," Gay wrote in an e-mail. "There will be problems between the two, but if I can go into development with scientific insight, these problems can be dealt with."
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