Despite industry and earlier Bush Administration claims that too much federal land in the Rocky Mountain West was unavailable for energy development, a report issued by the Bush Administration in January, 2003, indicates that the opposite is true -- that is, most of the federal oil and gas resources in this environmentally sensitive region are currently available for leasing and development.
In January, 2003, the Department of the Interior released its long-awaited study of "restrictions and impediments" to the development of oil and gas resources on federal lands in the Rocky Mountain region, mandated by amendments to the Energy Policy Conservation Act in 2000. According to this report (Scientific Inventory of Onshore Federal Lands' Oil and Gas Resources and Reserves…) 88% of the region's "technically recoverable" natural gas resources, and 85% of the "technically recoverable" oil on federal lands is currently available for leasing and development. In other words, only 12% of natural gas resources lies beneath national parks, wilderness areas, and other protected lands, while only 15% of publicly owned oil deposits are off-limits to development. If non-federal oil and gas resources within the study area are included, the amount of gas in the study area off-limits to development drops to only 7 percent, and oil to about 9 percent.
The Bush Administration's "National Energy Policy" claims that "…about 40 percent of the natural gas resources on federal land in the Rocky Mountain region have been placed off-limits" to development (NEP, p. 5-10). This echoed allegations made by the oil and gas industry that it has not enjoyed enough "access" to public lands due to various environmental "restrictions" and "impediments." The facts do not substantiate this claim.
Insignificant Impact on National Supplies
Considered in a national context, less than 1 percent of U.S. “technically recoverable” natural gas resources are precluded from development by current environmental safeguards in the Rocky Mountain West. In 1999, the National Petroleum Council estimated that the U.S. "natural gas resource base" (excluding Alaska) was 1,466 trillion cubic feet (TCF)*. The new DOI report estimates that only about 15.9 TCF of gas on federal lands in the Rocky Mountain states is off limits due to environmental safeguards -- less than 1% of U.S. gas resources.
Bottom Line: Despite industry and Bush Administration assertions to the contrary, the vast majority of oil and gas resources on the public lands of the Rocky Mountain West are, by the Bush Administration's own admission, available for leasing and development, and very little is off limits for environmental reasons. Instead of promoting policies and legislation that will encourage more lands to be open for energy development in the region, with fewer environmental safeguards, the real urgency is to make sure that we are not sacrificing the long-term ecological health and environmental values of our last remaining wild lands for the short-term economic gain of the energy industry.
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