Department

The Alaska Department of Natural Resources (DNR) will hold its annual Cook Inlet and Alaska Peninsula area-wide oil and gas lease sales, as well as a lease sale for geothermal resources on Augustine Island, on Wednesday, May 8. Terms can be obtained in the “Headlines” section of the DNR website. The Augustine Island lease sale is the fourth geothermal lease sale in state history. The last lease sale of this kind was held in 2008 for acreage on Mount Spurr. The Cook Inlet sale includes 815 tracts encompassing 4 million acres. The Alaska Peninsula lease sale includes 1,047 tracts covering 5.8 million acres. The Augustine Island geothermal sale includes 26 tracts on nearly 66,000 acres. In the past two years, the Cook Inlet hydrocarbon basin has seen a resurgence in investment by small, medium and large energy companies, DNR said. Bidders must be qualified by 4 p.m. May 3, and bids must be received no later than 4 p.m. May 6.

The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Tuesday released its first-ever rapid ecoregional assessment (REA), which takes a broad look at the ecology of the Colorado Plateau.

Transocean Ltd.’s agreement with the Department of Justice (DOJ) to pay $1 billion in civil penalties related to the 2010 Macondo well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico has been approved by U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier in New Orleans. Transocean had employed nine of the 11 men who were killed when the company’s Deepwater Horizon drilling platform was destroyed. The company already has pleaded guilty to a criminal misdemeanor and agreed to pay a separate $400 million fine to DOJ (see Daily GPI, Feb. 15; Jan. 4).

Guidelines put in place last year by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to expedite the drilling permit application process have significantly reduced the agency’s backlog, DEP said Thursday.

While the Department of Energy (DOE) has yet to decide whether to approve widespread exports of liquefied domestic natural gas, it has already handicapped the field of proposed projects should it decide to proceed. First in line are eight of the 23 project proposals received by DOE that also are currently being reviewed by FERC.

Thanks to Pennsylvania air quality regulations and the “increased use of natural gas in the power generation sector,” Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary Mike Krancer said air pollution has “gone down considerably” within the state since 2008, even as the unconventional production of shale oil and gas ramped up.

Guidelines put in place last year by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to expedite the drilling permit application process have significantly reduced the agency’s backlog, DEP said Thursday.

Thanks to Pennsylvania air quality regulations and the “increased use of natural gas in the power generation sector,” Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary Mike Krancer said air pollution has “gone down considerably” within the state since 2008, even as the unconventional production of shale oil and gas ramped up.

While the Department of Energy (DOE) has yet to decide whether to approve widespread exports of liquefied domestic natural gas, it has already handicapped the field of proposed projects should it decide to proceed. First in line are eight of the 23 project proposals received by DOE that also are currently being reviewed by FERC.