The exception page in a Broomfield title commitment tends to arrive with more paragraphs than the rest of the contract combined, and somewhere in that stack sits language about a "mineral estate" that may have been "severed, leased, or otherwise conveyed" from the property, with a note that whoever holds it "may include the right to enter and use the property without the surface owner's permission." Buyers read that once and start picturing a drill rig in the backyard.
Most of the time they are looking at the wrong document for that fear. Colorado law requires this mineral-severance notice on nearly every title policy in the state where a search turns up historical evidence of split ownership between what's on the surface and what's underneath it. It is a statute, C.R.S. 10-11-123, and it shows up on properties that have never seen a permit application in their history. Broomfield has a second, separate disclosure that actually does track drilling activity, tied to a specific distance from a specific well. Buyers who conflate the two end up either dismissing a notice they should have investigated or panicking over one that says nothing about their particular lot.
Two Notices, Not One
The statewide notice under C.R.S. 10-11-123 exists because Colorado has a long history of surface and mineral rights being sold or reserved separately, sometimes generations ago. Title companies are required to flag it whenever a search finds recorded evidence that this happened, regardless of whether anyone has ever drilled nearby or ever plans to. It is a disclosure about ownership history, not a forecast.
Broomfield's local notice is different. Under section 16-28-190 of the city's municipal code, any lot within 2,000 feet of a producing, permitted, or proposed oil or gas location, or a plugged and abandoned well, gets a formal notification. This one is about physical proximity to an actual site, and it treats an active production pad the same way it treats a well that was capped and reseeded years ago. Both trigger the notice. Only one represents ongoing operations.
A buyer who sees both notices on the same commitment is often looking at two unrelated facts stapled together: a centuries-old pattern of mineral ownership that touches most of the Front Range, and a distance calculation from a specific well that might be actively producing or might be a closed file the city is still monitoring for soil gas.
What Broomfield's Well Count Actually Shows
As of November 2025, Broomfield County had 92 producing wells, 10 being drilled, 7 approved to drill, 23 shut in, and 121 plugged or abandoned wells, according to the community tracking group Colorado Rising, which follows county-level well status across the state.
| Status | Count (Nov. 2025) |
|---|---|
| Producing | 92 |
| Being drilled | 10 |
| Approved to drill | 7 |
| Shut in | 23 |
| Plugged and abandoned | 121 |
Plugged and abandoned wells outnumber producing wells by more than a factor of one to one across this list, and every one of them can still generate a 2,000-foot notification if a nearby property changes hands. Broomfield runs an ongoing soil gas screening program specifically to check plug integrity on these closed sites, which is a maintenance obligation, not a sign of active risk. A notice tied to a plugged well and a notice tied to a producing pad look identical on a title commitment. They are not the same fact.
The Rule Changed in 2019, But Not for Every Permit
Colorado's oil and gas framework shifted substantially with Senate Bill 19-181, signed in 2019 after years of conflict in exactly this part of the state. Before the bill, new wells only had to sit 500 feet from a home. The Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission's rule change that followed quadrupled that to 2,000 feet, with the new distance taking effect in January 2021. The bill also raised the bar on forced pooling, the process that let an operator compel a nonconsenting mineral owner to join a drilling unit. Where a single consenting owner had been enough to trigger pooling, the reform pushed that threshold toward roughly 45 percent of mineral interests, and it expanded local governments' authority to regulate the surface impacts of drilling within their own boundaries.
That reform did not apply retroactively to every permit already on file. In January 2024, the Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission rejected a plan by Extraction Oil and Gas to complete 18 additional wells on the Coyote Trails pad, straddling the Broomfield and Erie border, in what regulators described as a heavily populated area. The site had drilled 27 wells under an older, pre-2019 permit before construction paused, and when the company moved to finish the remaining wells years later, local officials said they received no new notice and no new hearing, because the original approval predated the rules that would have required either. An Erie town official told the Colorado Sun he only learned of the plan by checking the commission's website directly.
That is the detail that matters more than any single well count. A permit issued before 2019 can still move forward today without triggering the notice-and-hearing process that now governs new applications. The safeguards a 2026 buyer assumes are universal only apply to permits filed after the reform took effect.
What This Means If You're Under Contract in Broomfield
None of this makes a mineral notice something to ignore, and none of it makes every notice something to fear. It makes the notice a prompt to ask a more specific question than most buyers think to ask.
- Ask your title company which statute the exception cites. A C.R.S. 10-11-123 reference is about historical severance. A reference to Broomfield's municipal code is about a specific well within 2,000 feet.
- Check the address directly against Broomfield's Oil and Gas Map Viewer, which shows well locations and status rather than relying on the notice language alone.
- If a nearby well shows up, ask when it was permitted. A pre-2019 permit means the newer notice-and-hearing protections may not apply if the operator returns to complete or expand the site.
- Distinguish a plugged and abandoned well from a producing one before deciding how much weight the notice deserves. They generate the same paperwork and mean very different things on the ground.
- Bring the specific well status to your lender early if it comes up, rather than assuming the notice itself is a financing obstacle.
A Few Questions Buyers Ask Once They See the Notice
Does a mineral-severance notice mean someone will drill on my property? Not by itself. It means the title search found evidence that the mineral estate was split from the surface estate at some point, which is common history across Colorado properties and does not indicate an active or planned well.
Is a plugged well the same risk as an active well? No, though both can trigger the same 2,000-foot notice under Broomfield's code. A plugged and abandoned well is subject to the city's ongoing soil gas screening program rather than active production.
Does this only affect Broomfield? The statewide mineral-severance notice appears on title commitments across Colorado. The 2,000-foot municipal notification and the map viewer referenced here are specific to the City and County of Broomfield.
A title commitment full of exception language is doing its job when it makes a buyer stop and ask what each line actually refers to. The answer in Broomfield is rarely simple, but it is knowable, and it is worth knowing before the objection deadline rather than after closing.
If you're evaluating a specific address in Broomfield and want help reading what a title commitment is actually telling you, Gregg Francis can walk through it with you before you're up against a deadline.
