Offshore staff
WASHINGTON, D.C.– The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) will offer 75.9 million acres offshore Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida for oil and gas exploration and development in Lease Sale 249.
The region-wide lease sale scheduled for Aug. 16, 2017, will include all available unleased areas in federal waters of theGulf of Mexico and provide a reduced royalty rate for shallow-water leases to encourage exploration and production under current market conditions.
Lease Sale 249 will include about 14,220 unleased blocks, located from 3 to 231 mi (5 to 372 km) offshore, in the Gulf’s Western, Central and Eastern planning areas in water depths ranging from 9 to more than 11,115 ft (3 to 3,400 m).
Excluded from the lease sale are blocks subject to the Congressional moratorium established by the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act of 2006; blocks that are adjacent to or beyond the US Exclusive Economic Zone in the area known as the northern portion of the Eastern Gap; and whole blocks and partial blocks within the current boundary of the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary.
Scheduled to be livestreamed from New Orleans, this will be the first offshore sale under the national Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2017-2022. Under this program, 10 region-wide lease sales are scheduled for the Gulf. Two lease sales will be held each year and include all available blocks in the combined Western, Central, and Eastern Gulf of Mexico planning areas.
07/14/2017
