The Bush administration has redrawn the boundaries in the eastern Gulf of Mexico in such a manner that it gives Louisiana authority over waters that are close to 100 miles from Florida’s shores, and includes portions of the gas-rich Lease Sale 181, according to a legislative aide for Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL), a staunch opponent of oil and gas drilling off the Sunshine State’s coastline.

A map published in the Federal Register last week shows that the Interior Department’s Minerals Management Service has drawn an administrative line in the eastern Gulf straight through the gas-rich Lease 181, apparently putting Louisiana in the position to have a say-so over activity in millions of acres of waters that historically had been under the control of Florida in the eastern Gulf.

“It’s very suspect when they [Interior] draw these lines two weeks before they are to come out with a [draft] five-year-leasing plan” for leasing activity on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) during the upcoming 2007-2012 period, said Bridget Walsh, deputy legislative director for Nelson. It’s “almost certain” now that the agency will open up Lease 181 to drilling in the five-year plan, she told NGI. Interior is expected to issue its draft five-year leasing plan at the end of this month or in early February.

By drawing the administrative line through the eastern Gulf, Interior in effect is telling “Florida [that] you have no beef because this [Lease 181 region] is off the coast of the state of Louisiana” now, Walsh said.

If Walsh’s suspicions are correct, it would mean that Interior has done an about-face. Last August, when it initiated the process to develop the five-year leasing plan, Secretary Gale Norton reaffirmed the Bush administration’s pledge not to conduct any new leasing under the 2007-2012 plan within 100 miles of the Florida coast (see Daily GPI, Aug. 23, 2005).

Interior indicated in the Federal Register last week that the administrative line was drawn to primarily accommodate alternative energy projects on the OCS, but Walsh said this “has implications far beyond that.”

She noted that Nelson plans to introduce legislation when the Senate returns later this month to block Interior’s efforts. He wants his bill to have bipartisan support from the entire Florida delegation, she said.

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