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Fact Sheet – 2007-2012 Revised Program (RP):
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The RP was submitted to the Court on December 23, 2010, and
represents the Secretary’s final program decision for the 2007-2012
Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Oil and Gas Program, pursuant to the
Court’s remand, and supersedes the original program approved on June
29, 2007. The 2007 program was revised pursuant to the D.C. Circuit
Court’s April 2009 finding that the Environmental Sensitivity
Analysis was insufficient. On July 29, 2009, the Court limited its
mandate to the Beaufort, Chukchi, and Bering Seas Planning Areas.
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In
response, the Department conducted a more complete environmental
sensitivity analysis, including analysis beyond the shoreline that
compares the environmental sensitivity of all 26 OCS planning areas
and identifies those areas whose environments are most and least
sensitive to OCS activity. After reviewing the new analysis and
rebalancing the factors required by the OCS Lands Act, Secretary
Salazar announced his Preliminary Revised Program (PRP) for
2007-2012 on March 31, 2010. The Department submitted the PRP to
the Court, the President, and the Congress. The Department
announced a 30-day public comment period, to May 3, 2010. During the
comment period, the Department received over 118,000 comments for
the Secretary’s consideration.
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On
December 1, 2010, Secretary Salazar announced his new OCS Oil and
Gas Strategy and on December 23, he submitted the RP to the Court
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The RP supersedes the original program decision made in 2007 and
serves as the 7th program prepared since Congress passed
the OCS Lands Act Amendments in 1978. The RP proposes 16 sales in
six of the 26 OCS planning areas in the Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, and
Atlantic during the 5-year period of July 1, 2007 to June 30, 2012.
These sales, some of which have been cancelled, include:
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11 area-wide sales in the Central and Western Gulf of Mexico (GOM) Planning Areas
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A sale in the Eastern GOM Planning Area
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A sale in the Mid-Atlantic Planning Area, 50 miles offshore Virginia
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Two special interest sales in Cook Inlet Planning Area off the coast of Alaska
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A sale in the Chukchi Sea Planning Area off the coast of Alaska
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Nine of these sales have already been held as indicated in the following planning areas: Sale 204 in the Western GOM in 2007, Sale 205 in the Central GOM in 2007, Sale 193 in the Chukchi Sea in 2008, Sale 206 in the Central GOM in 2008, Sale 224 in the Eastern GOM in 2008, Sale 207 in the Western GOM in 2008, Sale 208 in the Central GOM in 2009, Sale 210 in the Western GOM in 2009, and Sale 213 in the Central GOM in 2010
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Eastern Gulf Sale 224 is included on the list of
sales as a historical record of lease sale activity during the
time period. It was mandated by the Gulf of Mexico Energy
Security Act of 2006 and is not subject to OCS Lands Act section
18 analysis.
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On May 27,
2010, the Secretary cancelled Mid-Atlantic Sale 220 offshore
Virginia to allow time to implement measures designed to improve
the safety of oil and gas development in Federal waters, provide
greater environmental protection, and substantially reduce the
risk of catastrophic events, as well as to allow additional
consultations with the Department of Defense on military
training requirements in the area. The Secretary also cancelled
Western Gulf Sale 215, scheduled for August 2010, in light of
the need for time to determine whether the baseline
environmental information utilized in the multi-sale EIS
conducted for this lease sale may have changed dramatically as a
result of the April 2010 explosion and sinking of the Deepwater
Horizon. In addition, Cook Inlet Sale 211 was cancelled due to
lack of industry interest, and the second Cook Inlet sale will
be cancelled in the near future. Finally, Central GOM Sale 216
is being combined with Central GOM Sale 222, which is scheduled
to be held along with Western Gulf Sale 218, following
completion of a Supplemental EIS. A 5-year program is not
revised when sales are postponed, cancelled, or otherwise
revised during the pre-sale process; therefore, all of these
sales remain in the RP.
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Beyond these
changes, North Aleutian Basin Sale 214, Beaufort Sea Sales 209
and 217, and Chukchi Sea Sales 212 and 221, initially present in
the PFP, have been removed from the RP.
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