In compliance with congressional direction in the Inflation Reduction Act, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has accepted 307 highest valid bids from Lease Sale 257 in the Gulf of Mexico, totaling nearly $190 million, the Interior Department said in a release Sept. 14.
At the time of the November 2021 lease sale, BOEM said the region-wide sale received 317 bids from 33 companies on 308 of the 15,148 blocks offered, resulting in a total of $191.7 million in high bids. The sale was held Nov. 17, 2021, in New Orleans (OGJ Online, Nov. 17, 2021).
The offshore oil and gas lease sale was invalidated months later by a federal judge who ruled that the administration must run additional calculations on the leasing plan’s potential contributions to global greenhouse gas emissions (OGJ Online, Jan. 28, 2022).
The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, a tax and spending bill signed by Biden Aug. 16, includes provisions intended to push the administration into a resumption of onshore and offshore oil and gas lease sales by legally linking those sales to wind and solar energy development.