Lease sale in Alaska's National Petroleum Reserve is promised before the end of the year
The Obama administration announced Thursday it would grant one-year extensions of offshore leases delayed by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the administration's six-month moratorium and implementation of tougher regulatory standards.
View full sizeInterior Secretary Ken SalazarIt also promised to conduct a lease sale in Alaska's National Petroleum Reserve before the end of the year.
"As part of President Obama's comprehensive energy strategy, Interior is moving ahead with these concrete steps to continue to expand responsible and safe domestic oil production," said Interior Secretary Ken Salazar.
He said that under existing authority, his agency is "providing offshore energy companies the time to meet important safety standards when it comes to exploration and drilling."
The president promised to boost domestic production during a May 14 radio address that responded to criticisms by Gulf State lawmakers and others that his administration continued to place impediments to offshore drilling not warranted by the BP disaster.
Salazar said the administration took prudent steps to assure against a repeat of the BP disaster, including requiring a substantially better spill-containment plan than available to BP.
Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, said he wishes the administration's announcement explicitly dealt with shallow-water drilling.
"While we have been pushing the administration to extend oil and gas leases that were disrupted by their moratorium, the fact that they failed to include shallow-water drilling in the extension shows that they still fail to recognize the effect of their ongoing permitorium on both shallow-water and deepwater drilling which continues costing us thousands of American jobs, while increasing the price of gas at the pump," Scalise said.
Bruce Alpert can be reached at balpert@timespicayune.com or 202.857.5131.