U.S. offers record lease sale in Alaska reserve to oil, gas drillers
October 25, 2017
WASHINGTON, Oct 25 (Reuters) - The U.S. Interior Department said on Wednesday it will hold a lease sale for land in a federal reserve in northern Alaska to oil and gas drillers, the largest number of tracts ever offered from the reserve.
The sale, to be held on Dec. 6, will involve 900 tracts in part of the Indiana-sized mass of public land known as the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A). The federal government set aside the public lands in 1923 when the country was converting Navy vessels to run on oil instead of coal.
The sale is the latest move by the administration of President Donald Trump, a Republican, supporting his pledge to make the United States “energy dominant” by boosting output of oil, natural gas and coal.
On Tuesday, the Interior Department said it will hold its largest offshore auction to energy companies to date in March 2018. Nearly 77 million acres offshore Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida will be on offer.
Republicans are eager to open Alaska’s Arctic to oil and gas drilling, but it is uncertain how much energy companies, which are enjoying a drilling renaissance in the continental United States, are willing to invest in production in the frigid north...
Read the entire article at Reuters.
<- Go Back
Give Us Your Thoughts
