Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said on Friday that he has directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to hold an offshore oil and gas lease sale in the Gulf of America later this year.
This will be the first lease sale held under the Trump administration in the Gulf of America—which President Donald Trump has recently renamed from its former name, the Gulf of Mexico.
The Trump administration views opening the Outer Continental Shelf for oil and gas activities as an important element in securing the country’s energy dominance on the global stage.
Besides that, the department stated that lease sales, rental fees, and royalties from oil and gas activities on the Outer Continental Shelf will be directed to the Treasury, as well as to states through various revenue-sharing programs that fund conservation and outdoor recreation, which will benefit U.S. citizens.
The Gulf leasing will also generate “tens of thousands of high-paying jobs” for U.S. citizens, from exploration and production to service and supply chains, it stated.
The Outer Continental Shelf contains a major source of oil and gas critical for the nation’s energy supply. The department estimated that the leases on the “undiscovered fields” in the Gulf of America will produce 29.59 billion barrels of oil and 54.84 trillion cubic feet of gas.
The National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) has welcomed the oil and gas lease sale, saying the Gulf serves as “a cornerstone of America’s energy security, economic vitality, and job creation.”
“NOIA and our members look forward to working with American policymakers to sustain the Gulf’s role as a global leader in responsible energy production.”
The order states that “burdensome and ideologically motivated regulations” under the previous administration have hindered the development of the country’s energy resources, limited the generation of reliable and affordable electricity, reduced job creation, and led to high energy costs.
“It is thus in the national interest to unleash America’s affordable and reliable energy and natural resources,” Trump stated in his order.
The order directs government agencies to review “all existing regulations, orders, guidance documents, policies, settlements, consent orders, and any other agency actions (collectively, agency actions) to identify those agency actions that impose an undue burden on the identification, development, or use of domestic energy resources,” essentially reviewing dozens of actions related to energy sources by President Joe Biden and his administration.
