Producers and consumers “didn’t really gain anything” from the Obama administration’s recent plan to allow the potential development of the South Atlantic and Mid-Atlantic coasts and parts of the eastern Gulf of Mexico (GOM), said the president of the Institute for Energy Research (IER) Monday.

“If you look at this announcement, what the president actually did was to take the entire OCS [Outer Continental Shelf], which was open, and essentially closed up huge swaths of it — the West Coast, for example; he delayed or canceled five [lease sales] in Alaska…In addition to that, he kicked the can down the road for a year with respect to the Virginia lease [sale],” said IER’s Thomas J. Pyle during an interview on Environmental & Energy Daily’s OnPoint.

President Obama “gave platitudes to the issue,” he noted, adding that the Interior Department “unfortunately…took us backwards.”

The OCS leasing plan “was designed…to give Sen. Graham and Kerry, who are the lead proponents of the most recent effort to impose cap-and-trade, kind of the political cover to try and search for some extra votes amongst these middle-of-the-road [people] or the folks who haven’t really come out for or against” climate change legislation, Pyle said.

Sens. John Kerry (D-MA), Kelsey Graham (R-SC) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT), or KGL for short, are expected to unveil climate change legislation during Earth Week, which begins April 19. Industry anticipates that the bill will include a provision on expanded leasing on the federal OCS.

Pyle said he was unsure whether the OCS leasing plan would be enough to sway senators to support climate change legislation. “There’s really a lot of issues that haven’t [been] answered even with this [OCS] announcement. What will the senators do on revenue sharing, for example?” Pyle asked.

“In order for the votes to materialize for an aggressive offshore exploration and production [program], they would have to take large congressional steps, and I just don’t know if the votes are there for that,” he said. And such a move could risk support for climate change.

“The further they [KGL] go giving a nod to the Sen. [Lisa] Murkowskis of the world [a proponent of drilling] they run the risk of losing the Sen. [Sherrod] Browns of the world [a green energy advocate]. So it’s a delicate balance,” Pyle noted.

In late March the Interior Department unveiled a plan to expand development of the entire GOM, with a focus on the gas-rich eastern GOM; increase exploratory activity in new frontier areas, such as the Mid-Atlantic (offshore Virginia) and South Atlantic regions and the Arctic Ocean; while putting Alaska’s Bristol Bay off-limits as a national treasure. It also took the West Coast off the table, deeming it “too special” and in need of protection. And it postponed the scheduled Virginia lease sale to 2012 from 2011 (see Daily GPI, April 1).

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