When Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced in February that he was canceling oil and gas leases for 77 parcels in Utah that were auctioned in December 2008 by the Bush administration, the American Petroleum Institute went into full crisis mode.
"We hope," API President Jack Gerard said at the time, that the decision "does not signal the [Obama] administration is returning to the failed policies of the past, leaving much of America's vast energy resources locked up."
On Thursday, the department released the results of an internal review that determined that of the 77 parcels, at least 56 may be appropriate for development pending site-specific assessments by a Bureau of Land Management team. An additional 20 parcels, within five to ten miles of National Park units, "should receive heightened scrutiny because their development could more immediately impact air quality." One parcel, adjacent to Dinosaur National Monument, was singled out for "more deliberative review."
Well, critics may wonder, if many of the parcels may be appropriate for development, why the kerfuffle? Because, Salazar said, "in the rush to sell the leases, the previous administration bypassed normal reviews and consultations with the National Park Service." There was also the matter of a court decision that enjoined the sale. More about that later.
Interior said that when preparations for the lease sale began last fall, BLM informed the Park Service (another unit of the Interior Department) in the customary fashion. It identified parcels that were proposed to be in the sale and requested input. Subsequently, BLM decided to expand the sale from 79 parcels to 241 parcels without prior notice to NPS, and included a number of parcels in the immediate vicinity of three National Park units.
A third party informed NPS of BLM's actions two days before BLM was scheduled to publicly announce the expanded lease sale on Nov. 4, 2008. "Because NPS had not received prior notice and an opportunity to discuss the appropriateness of auctioning parcels next to units of the National Park system, NPS requested that BLM defer the late-added parcel until the next quarterly sale, so that NPS could have a full opportunity to review and comment," Interior said. "BLM refused to do so."
Only after "strong public concern was expressed" regarding the proposed sale of many of the parcels, and a "short but intensive period of negotiations," BLM agreed to remove parcels that were most objectionable to NPS. The Park Service remained concerned about other parcels near the parks, but acquiesced with the BLM auction going forward, if BLM would recommit to its historic consultation practices with NPS, and provide NPS "with advanced notice and an opportunity to consult before allowing exemptions, modifications or waivers to original lease terms."
On a related front, five days before the Bush administration left office, administration appointees representing BLM and the US Forest Service (a unit of the Agriculture Department,), cooked up a deal and executed a Memorandum of Understanding which asserted that quantitative air quality analysis would not be appropriate when making oil and gas planning decisions. A subsequent meeting to address the Park Service request to address air quality issues in the airsheds surrounding the three national parks ended in an "impasse," Interior said.
Salazar did not act in a vacuum when he cancelled the lease sale. Just two weeks earlier, a federal district court issued a temporary injunction against the sale of the 77 parcels after concluding that the plaintiffs had established "a likelihood of success on the merits" regarding claims that the proposed sales violated the National Environmental Policy Act, the Federal Land Management Policy Act, and the National Historic Preservation Act.
In its response to Interior's report, API expressed concern that it "could be used to justify inaction on development of energy resources." To the contrary, perhaps the report could be used to make future lease sale less vulnerable to legal challenge, and to ensure that proposed sales are properly vetted. Perhaps one of the "failed policies of the past" that should concern API was rushing through a leasing plan and bypassing the normal review and consultations process.
As for the MOU on air quality analysis, the report recommends that BLM develop a comprehensive strategy for the region in consultation with NPS, the Environmental Protection Agency and state officials. The court "relied on the absence of quantitative air modeling" in granting the injunction, Interior said. 'The court acted in the context of BLM's unwillingness to make any commitment to undertake quantitative air quality analyses for any leasing activity."
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