US to offer Gulf of Mexico lease sale in March

The largest oil and gas lease sale ever held in the US – for 311,478 square kilometres within the Gulf of Mexico – is planned for March.

US Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke said the proposed region-wide lease sale, offshore from Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, included all available unleased areas on the Gulf’s outer continental shelf.

Proposed Lease Sale 250, which will be livestreamed from New Orleans, will be the second offshore sale under the National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2017-2022.

It includes 14,375 unleased blocks, located from five kilometres to 320 kilometres offshore, in the Gulf’s Western, Central and Eastern planning areas and in water depths ranging from three metres to 3,400 metres.

“In today’s low-price energy environment, providing the offshore industry access to the maximum amount of opportunities possible is part of our strategy to spur local and regional economic dynamism and job creation and a pillar of President Trump’s plan to make the United States energy dominant,” Secretary Zinke said.

“And the economic terms proposed for this sale include a range of incentives to encourage diligent development and ensure a fair return to taxpayers.”