Crude Oil, Featured, Government, Natural Gas, News, North America, Unconventionals

BLM ends five-year drilling moratorium in central California

by Erika Green

Share on Facebook

 

Share on LinkedIn

 

Share

Share on Twitter

 

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has approved a plan to open up 1.2 million acres in central California to hydraulic fracturing (fracking), Kallanish Energy reports.

The agency last week released the record of decision that ends a five-year moratorium on drilling on public lands or seeking federal minerals in eight counties around Bakersfield, California.

The counties impacted include eastern Fresno, western Kern, Kings, Madera, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Tulare and Ventura counties.

The Bakersfield planning area covers 400,000 acres of BLM-managed lands and an additional 1.2 million acres of federal mineral estate. Most of the land lies within California’s San Joaquin Valley.

Environmental groups pledged to fight the expanded California drilling in the Bakersfield area.

The BLM announcement comes after Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Nov. 19 plans to curtail drilling projects in California, as the state moves to phase out oil drilling.

The BLM, in a supplemental Environmental Impact Statement, concluded there would be no adverse environmental impacts in the eight counties from fracking that cannot be alleviated.

The report looked at a wide array of drilling impacts and included reports from federal, state and local agencies. Issues that were examined include air issues, water quality and quantity, seismicity, mineral resources and socioeconomic factors.

Drilling could produce 3,500 jobs and more than $200 million per year in economic benefits, the BLM said.

The decision supports decisions made by BLM in 2014 and does not make any additional public lands available for drilling.

In May 2017,the agency had been ordered in court to prepare the additional environmental analysis. The BLM had agreed not to approve any drilling projects in the affected area until that report was finalized.

Last October, the Trump administration announced plans to allow drilling on 725,500 acres across 11 counties in the Central Coast and Bay Area of California. Conservation groups have filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in California to block that move.

Leave a Comment

STAY CONNECTED

Suspendisse eget lacus ac lorem vulputate fringilla. Maecenas consectetur est leo, nec scelerisque nulla dignissim quis. Maecenas ut nunc ac mi rhoncus mollis. Mauris sagittis rutrum mi a cursus.

Contact

Britannia House
11 Glenthorne Rd
Hammersmith, UK, W6 0LH

Call Us: +44 (0) 208 735 6520

[email protected]

© 2018 Kallanish. All rights reserved.