Drilling in public lands, which seemed to be easy and smooth for oil and gas companies during the Bush administrations, will have to undergo harder new regulatory hurdles and environment scrutiny. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced the new changes on Wednesday.
Under this new policy, the Bureau of Land Management was directed to do on-site assessment and gather extended public input on proposed oil and gas leases. Currently the BIM oversees more than 260 million acres of federal land.
Salazar quipped that the changes were done to restrict the earlier exemption of detailed environmental studies of drilling proposals.
During the policy-making procedure, it was found by the Government Accountability Office that a generous waiver of customary environmental reviews before drilling were allowed by some bureau officials.the waiver is available under 2005 energy law. The interior department has confirmed that they have the authority to change the way the waiver being used by bureau officials.
He also added “The previous administration’s anywhere-anyhow policy on oil and gas development ran afoul of communities, carved up the landscape and fueled costly conflicts that created uncertainty for investors and industry.”
How ever the energy companies are naturally not delighted at all with the policy change.
Kathleen Sgamma, director of government affairs for the Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States said”We are disappointed to see the Department of Interior “moving to a bureaucratic command-and-control system in which government bureaucrats — rather than scientists with expertise in natural gas and oil developments — dictate where energy development should occur.”
Kelly C. op de Weegh, Spokeswoman of Shell Oil Co. added that “ Shell believes that environmental analysis of a proposed lease area is vitally important, but redundant or unnecessary analysis that has no benefit only delays jobs and the delivery of energy to consumers.”
On the other hand, Conservationist and democratic lawmakers applauded and welcomed this new change saying that it a much-needed step to safeguard the western landscape and wildlife.