Lease

The Department of Interior plans to prioritize conservation of a mule deer migration corridor in southwest Wyoming through both deferred oil and gas lease sales and lease stipulations, Secretary Ryan Zinke and Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead said Wednesday.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in Utah has opened a scoping period through July 31 for the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process to evaluate a proposed oil and gas lease sale for 330,000 acres of federal land. The lease sale is tentatively scheduled for December. Information and scoping comments are available at BLM’s National NEPA Register project page.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in Utah reported Tuesday that it completed an oil and natural gas lease sale for 11 or 12 parcels offered, netting $186,617.

Reflecting the continuing surge in Permian Basin drilling, the New Mexico State Land Office (SLO) reported that it is nearing a record in oil and natural gas lease sale revenues, following the completion of a March auction that netted nearly $1.5 million.

Preliminary proceeds from Bureau of Land Management (BLM) oil and natural gas lease sales conducted last year totaled $360 million, an 86% increase over 2016’s total of $192.5 million, federal officials said.

The Trump administration eliminated a series of Obama-era reforms to the Bureau of Land Management’s onshore oil and natural gas leasing program, including the use of master leasing plans (MLP), on the grounds that the reforms were duplicative and burdensome to the oil and gas industry.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) found market resistance in its quarterly lease auction in Utah on Tuesday, selling only three of the nine parcels up for bid.

In the first lease sale covering the entire Gulf of Mexico (GOM) since 1983, the Lower Tertiary Trend, an intriguing deepwater play that has yielded big-time discoveries, captured most of the attention.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is proposing to reduce the royalty rate for Gulf of Mexico (GOM) oil and natural gas leases sold during the August federal sale to 12.5% from 18.75%.