In a statement posted on its website this week, the US Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) announced that it will issue the Final Notice of Sale (FNOS) and the Record of Decision (ROD) for the Gulf of Mexico Oil and Gas Lease Sale 261 in the Federal Register on August 25, “as required by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022.”
BOEM indicated in the statement that it plans to carry out the lease sale on September 27. Lease Sale 261 will offer approximately 12,395 blocks on approximately 67 million acres on the US Outer Continental Shelf in the Western, Central and Eastern planning areas in the Gulf of Mexico, according to the release.
In a separate statement posted on its site in March, BOEM said it would publish the proposed notice of sale (PNOS) for an oil and gas lease sale in the Gulf of Mexico, “which is scheduled to be held on September 2023”.
“Gulf of Mexico Oil and Gas Lease Sale 261 will offer approximately 13,620 blocks on 73.4 million acres on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf in the Western, Central and Eastern Planning Areas,” BOEM noted in that statement, adding that the IRA directed BOEM to hold the 261 lease sale no later than September 30, 2023.
In January, BOEM released a final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for the lease sale “that analyzed potential impacts on important environmental resources and identified robust mitigation measures to consider in leasing the area,” highlight BOEM in its latest statement.
“The terms of the lease sale include stipulations to mitigate potential adverse effects on protected species and avoid potential conflicts with other maritime uses,” the organization said in the statement.
“BOEM’s proposed economic conditions are designed to encourage diligent development while ensuring fair market value to ratepayers while maintaining IRA compliance,” BOEM added.
In a statement posted on the American Petroleum Institute’s (API) website in response to BOEM’s FNOS for Lease Sale 261, Holly Hopkins, API’s vice president of Upstream Policy, said: “while the DOI announced a sale of ‘much-needed off-lease… the Biden administration continues to throw roadblock after roadblock at US energy production, prioritizing his campaign promise to stop US oil and natural gas development in federal waters above their duty to meet the energy needs of Americans”.
“With this announcement, the administration is removing approximately six million acres from the Gulf of Mexico and adding new and unwarranted restrictions on oil and gas vessels operating in that area, amounting to a sale of a lease in name only” , Hopkins added.
“These restrictions are not supported by the record and are directed at the oil and natural gas industry men and women operating in this region while ignoring all vessel traffic…. [This] The announcement leaves US energy developers in a period of prolonged uncertainty, with no future offshore lease sales scheduled,” Hopkins continued.
In a statement on the FNOS and ROD for the Gulf of Mexico 261 lease sale, which was sent to Rigzone, National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) President Erik Milito said: “The Gulf of Mexico is a long-standing and vital source of reliable, affordable and environmentally responsible energy that is crucial to our nation’s well-being.”
“We are the base of hundreds of thousands of jobs while being a source of some of the least carbon-intensive barrels in the world. We can contribute a lot to a nation, but government must be a partner in harnessing this strategic benefit national”, said Milito.
Rigzone has asked DOI, BOEM, and the Department of Energy (DOE) for comments on the API and NOIA statements.
The DOI had no comment. As of this writing, BOEM and DOE have not yet responded to Rigzone.
The last lease sale in the Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 259, was held on March 29, BOEM’s website shows.
Thirty-two companies participated in the sale, offering a total of $263.8 million in high bids on 313 parcels, according to the site, which notes that BOEM awarded a total of 299 leases in parcels covering approximately 1,599,448 acres.
“The accepted high bids are valued at $250,556,978,” BOEM’s site notes.
“BOEM rejected 14 high bids totaling $13,244,805.00. Rejected tracts will be available in future sales. The highest accepted bid was $15,911,947 submitted by Chevron USA, Inc for Keathley Canyon 96,” he adds.
To contact the author, please send an email andreas.exarcheas@rigzone.com
