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As oil and gas development continues to expand throughout the West,
more and more Bureau of Land Management lease sales are being
challenged by conservation groups, state wildlife departments and local
communities. But how state BLM offices handle those protests varies
from state to state, with some offices dropping contested parcels
fairly routinely and others rarely doing so.
According to BLM, the agency receives at least one protest on most
lease sales in the Rocky Mountain region, where most of the new energy
development in the West is occurring. Usually, the lease sale goes
ahead as planned, often with stipulations attached to leases in areas
where drilling could cause the most damage. But in the past couple of
years, several state BLM offices -- which have a great deal of autonomy
under the agency's largely decentralized structure -- have begun
withdrawing parcels identified as problematic by conservation groups,
local communities and, in an increasing number of cases, state wildlife
agencies.
At least four state BLM offices -- in Colorado,
Montana, Utah and Wyoming -- have purged protested parcels from lease
sales over the past two years. Yet other states, namely New Mexico,
rarely remove controversial parcels. And critics say the agency
continues to lease lands that are important for wildlife conservation
and watershed protection.
BLM officials note that they
have addressed concerns about leasing impacts, typically by including
stipulations that minimize those effects, such as requiring directional
drilling or timing requirements to ensure that development does not
conflict with mating season or other important wildlife activities. And
in some cases, the agency does remove parcels, primarily due to
wildlife concerns.
In February 2006, BLM removed some
parcels along the San Miguel River in Colorado after conservation
groups and Colorado Rep. Diana DeGette (D) criticized the inclusion of
areas within the watershed for the city of Grand Junction.
In
November of that year, BLM's Pinedale, Wyo., office pulled two parcels
from a Dec. 5 lease sale after the Wyoming Department of Game and Fish
raised concerns about the effects to big game and sage grouse. Other
parcels protested by conservation groups remained in the sale, however.
That decision followed two other protests from the state over wildlife
concerns, one in 2002 regarding the Trappers Point area and one in 2004
concerning the Upper Green River Basin.
In Utah, the BLM
state office decided to cancel a lease sale altogether. The quarterly
sale slated for November was nixed to give the agency more time to
analyze the effects of oil and natural gas drilling on wildlife
habitat. The decision -- BLM's first lease sale cancellation in 20
years -- came after the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources presented
information indicating that about 139,000 of the 141,000 leasable acres
were considered summer habitat for wildlife (Land Letter, Oct. 11, 2007).
More
often, BLM denies the protests and proceeds with the lease sale. In
Colorado, for instance, BLM put up for bid mineral parcels on about
22,000 acres in 22 roadless parcels in three national forests that
county commissioners, Colo. Sen. Ken Salazar (D), outfitters,
landowners and conservationists had protested. BLM typically manages
the federal mineral estate, regardless of which agency manages the
surface.
Also in Colorado, in its November 2006 and May
2007 lease sales, BLM leased what conservation groups have identified
as prime lesser prairie-chicken habitat on the Comanche National
Grassland.
Wildlife concerns
Most of the decisions to withdraw
contested parcels have been made because of wildlife concerns. In
Wyoming and Montana, state concerns about the impacts of oil and gas
drilling on sage grouse, which the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is
considering listing under the Endangered Species Act, have largely
driven BLM's withdrawals of lease sale parcels.
"If
the head of fish and game writes a letter saying don't lease these
parcels, you get some reaction from BLM," said Steve Belinda, energy
initiative manager for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership
and a former wildlife biologist with BLM in Wyoming and New Mexico.
T.O.
Smith, an energy specialist with the Montana Department of Fish,
Wildlife and Parks, said that since the agency protested the inclusion
of 10,000 acres in a blue-ribbon trout fishery and habitat for the sage
grouse, BLM has consulted with the state before offering new lands for
leasing. "We did one formal protest, and to the benefit to all of us,
they determined it would be better to work with us early," he said.
Sometimes,
parcels that are withdrawn from one sale will resurface in a future
sale. That was the case with the parcels in the Utah lease sale
canceled by BLM last November; Chris Keefe, a biologist with BLM's Utah
state office, said those lands will be offered in the next lease sale,
scheduled for February, with stipulations to protect big game species.
New Mexico on the defensive
Of all the oil and gas
producing states in the Rocky Mountain West, New Mexico has withdrawn
the fewest parcels. Conservation groups say the New Mexico BLM office
has become more dismissive of their protests over the past few years.
"We have successfully convinced them in some cases, but certainly in
the majority of cases, BLM issues the lease and moves forward, in spite
of us pointing out significant wildlife, wilderness and water values,"
said Nicole Rosmarino, wildlife program director for WildEarth
Guardians, formerly Forest Guardians. "This is a concerning trend,
because we raise a lot of issues they should look at under NEPA, but
they have ignored them."
Tony Herrell, deputy director of
BLM's New Mexico office, said the reason the agency rarely pulls
protested parcels is that the New Mexico office makes an extra effort
to address potential problems before deciding what areas to offer in a
lease sale.
"There have been a couple of times when we've
withdrawn parcels when we felt we hadn't done sufficient analysis, but
nothing like the extent you've seen in other states," he said. "What we
really try to do here is, if it's really controversial, we don't put it
in there to begin with. We try to work with people up front."
Yet
almost every quarterly lease sale in New Mexico is challenged by
WildEarth Guardians and other groups. Herrell said that is because of
philosophical differences over how much development is too much.
In
southeastern New Mexico, for example, BLM set aside important habitat
for the lesser prairie chicken that a collaborative group of local
interests had identified.
Herrell said the kind of
controversy that erupted over oil and gas leasing on Otero Mesa, where
Gov. Bill Richardson (D) urged BLM to scale back its plan, should be a
thing of the past under the office's new efforts to reach out to the
public and state resource agencies.
"That has to be our
future," he said. "Resolving issues, based upon the facts, based upon
dialogue, and based upon rationalization, not emotion."
The protests keep coming
Meanwhile, the protests continue.
In
BLM's Feb. 5 lease sale in Wyoming, TRCP protested 125 parcels on about
150,000 acres, saying that energy development would harm sage grouse
habitat, as well as winter range and migration corridors for mule deer,
elk and pronghorn (Land Letter, Jan. 24).
The Feb. 5 auction included 143 parcels totaling more than 165,300 acres.
In
January, the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, Center for Native
Ecosystems, Wyoming Outdoor Council and Wyoming Wilderness Association
joined a protest that takes aim at parcels offered in or adjacent to
wilderness study areas and areas that have been proposed for wilderness
protection, including Red Butte, Honeycombs, Cedar Mountain, Kinney
Rim, Adobe Town and Raymond Mountain.
"There's just
growing concern about this increase in leasing and development," said
Dave Alberswerth, public lands director for the Wilderness Society.
"BLM is in the process of cranking out more leases before the end of
this administration."
New BLM Director Jim Caswell has called for expanding energy development on federal lands.
April Reese writes from Santa Fe, N.M.
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