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DNR Secretary Scott Angelle attends first post-moratorium Gulf of Mexico federal lease sale

BATON ROUGE – Louisiana Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Secretary Scott Angelle said today he was pleased to see that federal regulators have moved forward on making offshore energy resources available for exploration, as the U.S. Bureau of Energy Management opened bids in New Orleans for the first lease sale in federal Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) waters since its moratorium. Due to the months-long moratorium on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, there was a cancellation of a lease sale planned for August 2010.

Angelle, who has led the state’s efforts to mediate OCS planning and permitting issues between federal regulators and energy exploration companies, attended the lease sale, a landmark event in the ongoing effort to restore a normal pace of activity for exploration and production operations that support jobs both onshore and offshore, and economic opportunities across the Gulf Coast.

Gov. Bobby Jindal in 2010, designated Angelle to head the Back-To-Work Coalition, an association of Gulf exploration stakeholders that continues to work and to help both federal regulators and the industry find a regulatory middle ground ensuring safe and responsible operations while allowing development of the resources that provide domestic energy and domestic jobs.

Today’s sale involved federal acreage in the Western Area Gulf of Mexico, also referred to informally as the Texas OCS – an area generally smaller than the Central Area of the Gulf of Mexico, referred to as the Louisiana OCS.  BOEM accepted lease bids totaling more than $330 million at the sale, higher than the average for Western Gulf OCS sales in the past 10 years. The amount is nearly triple the take in the Western Gulf sale in 2009.

“The fact this sale is happening at all and the federal government is making energy resources available for exploration is an indication of the progress we have made in pushing through many complicated issues,” Angelle said. “It is also gratifying to see the exploration industry express its faith, through participation in the sale, that the Gulf is still a critical part of the U.S. energy supply and that operators can work through the new regulations and put people back to work. We will look forward to another robust lease sale in the Central Gulf of Mexico this coming spring. ”