The Gulf of Mexico is where the Biden administration sells oil and gas leases
Biden’s Big Lease: Auctioning Off Water in the Gulf of Mexico to Offshore Oil and Gas Drilling in the Light of a Big Damned Willow
A few weeks after allowing the controversial Willow oil drilling project in Alaska to go forward, the Biden administration is auctioning off more than 73 million acres of waters in the Gulf of Mexico to offshore oil and gas drilling.
It followed a long and bitter legal battle after a judge tossed Biden’s attempt to ban new oil and gas leasing on federal land and water. The leases were canceled because of delays due to court rulings.
“There’s nothing in the IRA that required it to be so large,” said George Torgun, an attorney for Earthjustice, an environmental law group. “If it goes forward as planned, it’s double the size of Willow. It’s going to lock in fossil fuel development in the Gulf for the next 50 years.”
According to the Biden administration’s environmental analysis, the oil and gas drilling from this sale will emit over 20 million metric tons of carbon dioxide.
“We’re really disappointed we didn’t see something lesser in scope, this is basically offering up most of the Gulf,” Torgun said. “It’s another massive lease sale.”
Manchin was the author of the law provisions that required the Interior to hold oil and gas lease sales in the gulf and cook inlet. There will be another sale in September.
The Gulf of Mexico oil and gas auctioned despite a $Lambda$Billit in the Inflation Reduction Act
Amid an outcry on social media among young voters and climate groups, the administration ultimately said it had few options other than to approve the project. Biden said he had initially tried to block it and called it a difficult decision.
During a visit to Canada last week, Biden said that he wanted to disapprove of it across the board. “But the advice I got from counsel was that if that were the case, we may very well lose in court. It is better to lose that case in court.
The Gulf of Mexico auction comes as global oil markets are still in tumult, rife with investors uneasy about lingering impacts from the war in Ukraine and the threat of recession, said Bob McNally, an energy consultant and president of Rapidan Energy Group.
Most of the reason investors are reluctant to invest in oil is due to these fundamental issues, according to McNally. “It’s not because Joe Biden said there’s no [new] leasing. The political factor is present, but it isn’t the main reason they are held back.
Fossil fuel energy companies looking to extract oil and natural gas from U.S. waters in the Gulf of Mexico got a boost on Wednesday, as they secured access to 1.6 million acres of waters offered at auction.
But the administration says it was compelled to open the huge swath of Gulf waters to drilling because of stipulations in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. The budget act coalesceed around a deal Democratic leaders reached with their conservative colleague Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, inserting requirements for new oil and gas leases.
The law mandated that Lease Sale 259 be held “no later than March 30, 2023,” the BOEM said. It states that the Inflation Reduction Act bars Interior Secretary Deborah Haaland from issuing a lease for offshore wind until her agency holds an offshore oil and gas lease sale.
Dozens of bids were received in the sale by companies including Exxon Mobil. Many of the blocks attracted only one offer, and ranged from as low as $750 to millions of dollars.
The API and the IRA: Energy Leases for the Gulf Willow Project and the Future of the Oil and Gas Field in the United States
“Leases resulting from this sale will include stipulations to mitigate potential adverse effects on protected species and to avoid potential conflicts with other ocean uses in the region,” the agency said.
The auction in the Gulf after the willow project is against the administration’s pledges of fighting climate change, said Woody Martin, president of the Delta Chapter of the Sierra Club.
According to available science, the current path of rising carbon emissions that will lead to catastrophic consequences is a result of the US’s long-term dependence on fossil fuel.
Adding that “it should not take an act of Congress to get us to this point,” the API said energy companies need more certainty to meet growing energy needs.
“Expanding dirty energy will worsen the climate crisis and new leases for oil and gas drilling must stop because of this,” Diane Hoskins said. “President Biden may claim his hands were tied on this sale because of the IRA’s mandate, but he still has the opportunity to make good on his promise to end new oil and gas leasing in his Five-Year Plan.”
Haaland told the congressional budget hearing that the final plan will be out in September and will be effective in December.
Rep. Jake Ellzey, a Texas Republican, asked Haaland about rumors the plan might not include any sales. Haaland said she doesn’t know so she can’t make a determination before the planning process is underway.
