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1
Introduction
ORIGIN OF THIS REPORT
For much of the nation's history, the very size (Figure 1.1, Table
1.1) of our vast federal land estate fostered the impression that it could
accommodate all manner of uses with minimum constraint or controversy.
However, as our population and economy expanded and portions of the
public domain were sold or granted into private ownership, convicts over
the uses of the remaining federal lands multiplied. Society's increasing
demand for materials and energy resources to support economic growth
has contributed to these conflicts. They have been sustained, as well, by
a growing recognition of and desire to protect the noneconomic values
of wildlife, outdoor recreation, and open space values that are typically
perceived to be greatest where development, including mineral extraction,
is absent. These conflicts arise on the federal lands because large segments
of these lands have remained relatively undeveloped and are dedicated by
law to multiple-use management. Today, these lands constitute some 460
million acres administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in
the Department of the Interior and the Forest Service in the Department
of Agriculture, some 66.5 million acres of which was under lease for oil
and gas exploration and development as of fiscal year 1988 (BLM, 1989a;
Forest Service, 1989~.
For many years, Congress enacted and the land management agencies
implemented various discrete programs addressing individual uses of the
federal lands. Early attention was paid to the commodity or economic
6
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9
TABLE 1.1 Percentage of Federal Lands Within States
State
Percentage Federal Lands
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
Califomia
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
District of Columbia
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
. .
. ,oulslana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
~ ,. . . .
MlSSISSlppl
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Nonh Carolina
Nonh Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
1 exas
Utah
Vennant
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
3.3
87.1
43.1
9.9
46.4
36.2
0.4
2.4
28.0
12.4
5.4
16.4
63.7
1.4
1.9
0.4
1.1
5.5
4.0
0.8
3.1
1.6
10.0
6.8
5.5
4.7
30.5
1.5
85.1
12.8
3.3
31.3
5.1
7.0
4.4
1.2
1.9
48.7
2.2
0.7
6.0
5.6
7.0
1.9
63.6
5.4
9.7
29.2
7.6
5.2
49.5
,,
SOURCE: Bureau of Land Management (1989a).
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9
TABLE 1.1 Percentage of Federal Lands Within States
State Percentage Federal Lands
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
Califomia
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Distnct of Columbia
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
. . .
LOUIslana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
~ ,. . . .
MlSSISSlppl
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
Nonh Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
3.3
87.1
43.1
9.9
46.4
36.2
0.4
2.4
28.0
12.4
5.4
16.4
63.7
1.4
1.9
0.4
1.1
5.5
4.0
0.8
3.1
1.6
10.0
6.8
5.5
4.7
30.5
1.5
85.1
12.8
3.3
31.3
5.1
7.0
4.4
1.2
1.9
48.7
2.2
0.7
6.0
5.6
7.0
1.9
63.6
5.4
9.7
29.2
7.6
5.2
49.5
. . .
.,
SOURCE: Bureau of Land Management (1989a).
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This informational problem poses the question of whether the sur-
face impacts of oil and gas exploration and development can be fairly
and adequately identified during planning to ensure that those activities
are afforded equitable consideration with other federal land uses and
values that those activities are neither prematurely excluded from, or in-
discriminately included on, federal lands by inadequately informed planning
decisions. ~ the extent that such impacts cannot be properly identified
dunug planning, the question becomes how the congeries of values served
by the public lands can be identified and protected when the relevant infor-
mation becomes available during the subsequent leasing, exploration, and
development stages, particularly in those circumstances where the informa-
tion discloses that prospective oil and gas activities will have unacceptable
impacts on other uses and values.
Originally through their own initiative, and now in response to statutory
mandates, the BLM and the Forest Service prepare land use plans for the
lands they manage. Under the multiple-use management requirements
of the FLPMA and the NF~fA, these plans address the full panoply of
federal land uses, including both economic uses (e.g., mineral development,
timber production, livestock grazing, and ski resorts and other recreational
facilities) and noneconomic uses (e.g., hiking and camping). The plans
contain the decisions of the agencies as to which uses can be accommodated
where and at what times in the planned area.
Absent dramatic changes in conditions In the planned area, the life
of a land use plan may span 15 years (the prescribed maximum period
in NFMA (16 USC 1604(f)~5~), the projected standard period for BLM
plans). Most of the surface uses authorized in a plan occur, and thus impact
the environment, during the plan's term, and their levels of intensity and
environmental impacts can be estimated with some degree of accuracy.
The effects of oil and gas exploration and development are not neces-
sarily as contemporaneous or predictable. Oil and gas activities are likely to
occur well after the plan's term as illustrated in Figure 1.2. The resources
may not be leased until the last year of the plan: the fifteenth year. The
great majority of leases that result in any activity have the first significant
ground-disturbing action the drilling of an exploratory well after the ap-
proval by the agencies of an Application for Permit to Dril] (APD)-in
the last year of the lease term: the fifth year for competitive leases and
the tenth year for noncompetitive leases. If the well identifies oil or gas
in commercial quantities, additional APDs for development wells are sub-
mitted, and the field is developed after other permits and rights-of-way are
issued by the agency over another generally lengthy span of time: perhaps
a decade. Therefore the most significant impacts those associated with
full field development may occur 30 to 35 years or more after issuance of
the land use plan, 15 to 20 years or more after the plan's expiration.
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Years
~ 5 1 G 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50
'I i
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
BLM or Forest Service
Land Use Plan
I:~:i~llilllllllllTTIIllllI
Oil & Gas Lease
(Primary Term)
\\ Competitive
a//,//////// N on com pet i t i ve
APD Approval
Exploration Drilling
ho\\\\) competitive
/ /////: N on c om pe t i t i ve
Development & Production
.. ~//////~///////////////////////,//~
FIGURE 1.2 Duration and timing of venous oil and gas planning, leasing, and management
actions.
An equally significant distinction between the planning for oil and gas
exploration and development and the planning for most other federal land
uses is the problem encountered in projecting the level of the use s activities
and. thus the magnitude of the use s impacts. Unlike most surface uses and
even some mineral development such as coal mining, the volume and quality
of the oil or gas resource are seldom known at the time land use planning
is conducted, making projections of exploration and development activity
levels and environmental impacts more difficult and less reliable. Even if
all the land that might be identified for leasing in the planning process is
leased during the plan s life, to attempt to identify during planning. where
on the leased land surface-impacting activities may occur is problematic.
Although statistics to make precise calculations are not available, the
committee was generally informed by the federal agencies that, as a rough
rule of thumb, approximately 10 percent of all oil and gas leases are ever
subject to well drilling, and only about 10 percent of the leases upon which
drilling occurs ultimately produce oil and gas in commercial quantities.
The committee has. not attempted independent verification of this 10/10
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percent rule of thumb. While the committee suggests that most leases are
never drilled, and few exploration.wells result in discovery,. it.is important
to note thatia single tract of land may-have been leased, and then re-leased
upon expiration. of the old lease, several. times since enactment of the
Mineral Leasing Act of 1920. The rule of thumb does not, in other words,
suggest that. only 10 percent of the land that is leased is ever subject to
exploratory drilling. Furthermore, approximately one-quarter of the total
leases currently in: effect (and one-fifth of the acreage currently under
federal lease) are in reproducing status (see Figure 2.3, p. 24~.
Finally, even if the assumption is made that exploration.and develop-
ment Drill ensue, the type and level of impacts' from production are not
known when planning ..~occurs. Producing fields vary wildly in size from: a
few hundred acres and a handful of wells (e.g., North Pine~view, Wyoming)
to more than 75,000 Acres And 21~..wells. (e.g., Riley Ridge, W3roming).
Within the field' impacts will correspond to such? factors as whether the
terrain is flat or hilly (whether drill pads and roads may be prepared with
minimal earth disturbance or with.excavation of cut' and fill slopes3, what
the wellhead. density and concomitant number of connecting service roads
and gathering lines will be (oil wells typically ' are' spaced.eve~y 40 acres, gas
wells every 640 acres, based on the wells' drainage capacity and the area's
geology), and what additional facilities may be needed (e.g., dehydration
plants, injection wells for disposal of produced- water or reinfection for
pressure maintenance, or. preparation plants f~ r~.mou'~. hvflr^~^n Q'']~^
from sour gas).
The Forest Service and the BLM have undertaken!signi~cant addi-
tional planning and..en~ronmental analysis after completion of land use
plans for some resources .that'~ when developed, may. have significant im-
pacts on-.surface values. The planning and ana~s'is are conducted at the
resource disposal (leasing, sale,.or rental) stage (e.g., :regional coal lease
sales, environmental impact statements, timber sale plans,. and allotment
management plans for livestock grazing.. permits), which permits analysis
closer to the time the impacts. will occur and when more detailed sit'e-
specific data are available. However? to attempt to duplicate such planning
and analysis at the leasing stage for oil and gas presents a separate, and
perhaps more difficult, set of.problems. - ' - " ' '
The conditions that permit additional planning and analysis at the
leasing, selling, or renting stage for other resources generally do not exist
for the leasing of onshore oil and gas. In the case of!coal' leasing, for
example, a sufficiently limited number of leases are' offered at sufficiently
lengthy intervals to permit site-specific analysis. ~ Oil and gas'' lease sales, on
the other.hand, typically involve- several tines the number 'of lease tracts
at much greater frequency than do regional coal lease sales. For example,
the largest regional coal lease sale occurred in the Powder River Region
r - - r ~ ~ Em_ ~ am., .v .~ ~ _~v ~ ~ z~ ~1 mill v UDIUO
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of Wyoming and Montana in 1982, where 13 lease tracts, totaling 23,000
acres, were offered. No Powder River federal coal lease sale has been held
or scheduled since 1982. By contrast, federal oil and gas lease sales in
Wyoming recently have been held on a bimonthly basis under the Reform
Act (which requires sales to be held at least quarterly) and have to date
involved an average of 800 competitive lease tracts totaling approximately
300,000 acres in each sale (BLM, 1989b). The frequency of oil and gas
lease sales and the large number of lease tracts in each sale diminish the
land management agencies' ability to conduct adequate site-specific analysis
at the leasing stage.
The additional planning conducted for timber sales and livestock graz-
ing on federal lands also Is infeasible under the present process for leasing
oil and gas. Again, these decisions lo sell timber and rent grazing rights
are made on a less frequent basis than the decisions to offer oil and gas
leases. More importantly, however, planning for timber sales and grazing
management concerns specific geographical areas of relatively limited size,
thus permitting meaningful data collection for, and analysis of, site-specific
and cumulative impacts. In contrast, the lease tracts offered in the quarterby
(or more frequent) federal oil and gas lease sales are scattered throughout
each sate. Additionally, the committee estimates that one~uarter of the
federal land available for oil and gas leasing is already leased. Pre-Reform
Act leases still outstanding were issued at monthly lease sales or upon
request and thus have many different expiation dates. The BI-M normally
reoffers for lease expiring leases after their expiration dates. For all these
reasons, the land management agencies do not assemble a number of tracts
irk a discrete geographical area, limit a prospective sale to those tracts, and
then plan the leasing and mitigation of impact in that area.
These differences in the timing, duration, extent, and impacts of oil
and gas leasing and subsequent exploration and development, compared to
other public land uses, have raised questions as to (1) how the land use
plans of the BLM and the Forest Service should address the oil and gas
leasing and management processes, and (2) when during those processes
environmental impacts should be analyzed and environmental constraints,
including prohibitions, placed on the various exploration and- development
activities. Stated more simply, the questions concern when and how the
two land management agencies should be required to say yes or lose the
right to say no to oil and gas exploration and development based on
environmental concerns.
This report provides recommendations for how oil and gas exploration
and development should be further integrated with the federal land use
planning process and where in the subsequent leasing and management
process further environmentally related analysis and decisions should be
made. Although the debate that led to the congressional directive for
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the study and the tasks identified for this report focuses on environmen-
tal concerns, the committee was highly cognizant of the economic and
social importance of oil and gas exploration and development on federal
lands-from maintaining national security to sustaining the local economy.
Underlying the committee's deliberations was a firm belief that orderly
leasing and management of federal onshore oil and gas resources must
result from any recommendations the committee makes.
ORGANIZATION OF THIS REPORT
Chapter 2 addresses the federal lands where multiple use planning
occurs and considers the role of the oil and gas industry in leasing, exploring,
and developing those lands. Chapter 3 presents the legal framework for
land use planning and for oil and gas leasing and management. The judicial
and administrative controversies that have framed the issues addressed in
this report are discussed in Chapter 4.
The planning process its evolution, its present status, and its likely
future-and the analytical requirements of the National Environmental
Policy Act and Endangered Species Act are presented in Chapter 5. This
chapter also describes how oil and gas exploration and development are
addressed in existing plans and how the agencies have proposed to treat
such activities in future planning. Chapter 6 provides similar discussions of
the oil and gas leasing and management process and how it relates to the
various stages of exploration and development.
Particular areas where conflicts between oil and gas exploration and
development are most intense, and the reasons those areas are the source
of such conflict, are the subject of Chapter 7. The final chapter, Chapter
8, presents the committee's conclusions and recommendations for "changes
in agency procedures and regulations, and statutory requirements, for both
the planning process and the oil and gas leasing and management process.
There are three important limitations-' on the scope''of this report.
First, the committee did not specifically address oil and gas planning issues
on federal lands in Alaska because statutes, regulations, data availability,
planning approaches, and actual conditions in that state differ considerably
from those in the lower 48. Second, the committee did not address Indian
lands for many of the same reasons. Multiple-use federal agency planning
is not required on Indian lands, and the federal trust responsibility in the
area of Indian resource development has no direct counterpart outside the
Indian context. Third, on nearly 50 million acres of land, the United States
owns the oil and gas (often along with other minerals) but does not' own
the surface (BLM, 1989a, liable 9~. Planning for resource development
where the surface is not owned or managed by the United States presents
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the agencies with somewhat different issues. The committee has not at-
tempted to fashion special recommendations for this context, but most of
the recommendations it does make are nevertheless applicable, in whole or
in part, to this setting.
it,
REFERENCES
Bureau of Land Management, Department of the Interior. 1989a. Public Land Statistics,
1988, Vol. 173.
Bureau of Land Management, Department of the Interior. 1989b. Competitive Sales by
BLM Offices, FY 1987 and FY 1988 (draft).
Forest Service, Department of Agriculture. 1989. Report of the Forest Service, Fiscal Year
1988.
U.S. Geological Survey and Bureau of Land Management. 1981. Federal Lands Subject to
Restnctions of Mineral Development. Map NAS-R 0401-75M-1.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
land management
