Reflecting America’s rapid and accelerating shift to clean energy, the Interior Department announced the fewest offshore oil and gas lease sales in history in its proposed final program for 2024–2029.
Call it “Least Sales”!
Proposed program includes zero oil and gas lease sales in the Atlantic, Pacific and Alaskan waters and it phases down leasing in the Gulf of Mexico, which will enable offshore wind programs to grow rapidly.
The reduction to a maximum of three potential lease sales in the Gulf will bring the Federal program in line with the Biden-Harris administration’s goal of net-zero emissions by 2050 and meet the Inflation Reduction Act requirements for future offshore renewable energy leasing.
Plan documents, as well as the economic analysis underlying them, are available for public inspection in the Federal Register or on BOEM’s website.
Meanwhile, our local Rep. Salud Carbajal is sponsoring a bill to impose a fee of $15 per metric ton on all fossil fuels extracted in the United States with a premium on imports. While this Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend was submitted three times before, it never made it out of the House committee.