US Rep. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) introduced legislation to ensure states that normally receive half of federal onshore oil and gas royalties under the Mineral Leasing Act actually receive the money.

The US Bureau of Land Management’s Rock Springs, Wyo., field office began a 30-day public scoping period on May 6 before it prepares an environmental assessment of Devon Energy Production Co. LP’s proposal to develop up to 20 new oil and gas wells within the Horseshoe basin unit.

The lives of more than 1 billion people worldwide could be transformed if their governments managed their countries’ oil, gas, and mineral resources in a more open and accountable manner, a new Revenue Watch Institute analysis concluded.

Rosneft and Petrovietnam have signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen cooperation in upstream and downstream oil and gas operations in Russia, Vietnam, and third countries.

Officials of the European Commission and European Free Trade Association Surveillance Authority made unannounced inspections at offices of BP, Shell, Statoil, and Platts in a step the EC described as “a preliminary step to investigate suspected anticompetitive practices.”

US Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.) introduced a bill on May 9 that aims to expedite construction of US natural gas pipelines by streamlining the permitting process and expediting approvals.

The US Bureau of Land Management’s Anchorage, Alas., office released a draft plan listing near-term priorities and actions to plug and clean up legacy wells in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, but the draft quickly drew fire from the state’s senior US senator.

Thirteen US House Republicans formed a working group to consider ways the federal Endangered Species Act is working, how it could be updated, and how to make it more effective. ESA matters to oil and gas producers as petitions to list species as endangered are filed with the US Fish and Wildlife Service, sometimes with the potential to severely restrict or outright prohibit exploration, production, and development.

US House Natural Resources Committee members from both sides of the aisle questioned whether Congress would be willing to fund a federal hydraulic fracturing regulatory regime at the US Bureau of Land Management.

Canada’s minister of natural resources has warned officials of the European Union against “discriminatory treatment” of fuels made from products of Canadian oil sands.

A test deployment of well control equipment was completed by the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), Noble Energy Inc., and the Helix Well Containment Group (HWCG) to assess Noble’s ability to respond to a potential subsea blowout in the Gulf of Mexico.

The American Petroleum Institute urged the US Environmental Protection Agency to use a full Clean Air Act rulemaking process for its proposed Tier 3 rule instead of a rushed review process API says the agency is contemplating.