Government Report Confirms West is Wide Open to Big Oil

by Mac Blewer

In a welcome surprise, the U.S. Departments of the Interior and Energy have released a report corroborating what conservationists have been saying for years: that the vast majority of our western public lands are wide open to energy development. The report stands in sharp contrast to the Bush Administration's claims that overly stringent environmental regulations are to blame for inadequate domestic energy supplies.

The Environmental Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) report, commissioned in 2000 to help guide western energy policy, clearly states that environmental protections on federal lands are no obstacle to oil and gas production and leasing. The areas examined in the study include Wyoming's greater Green River Basin (including the Red Desert) and Powder River Basin, and the Paradox/San Juan and Uinta/Piceance Basins in Colorado, Utah and New Mexico. The report concludes that in all of these areas combined, approximately 85% of the technically recoverable oil and 88% of the technically recoverable natural gas are available for leasing and drilling.

In Wyoming, the figures are even higher, with 88% of the technically recoverable oil and 90% of the technically recoverable gas available in the greater Green River Basin and 96% of the oil and 91% of the natural gas available in the Powder River Basin.

The report concludes that if the 3.9 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil and 138.5 trillion cubic feet of gas underlying federal lands in the Rocky Mountains were drilled, it would satisfy the nation's energy appetite for no more than 6.1 years for natural gas and only 198 days for oil.

Some have criticized the report for focusing exclusively on "technically recoverable" reserves instead of "economically recoverable" reserves, thus artificially boosting the amount of oil and gas that is actually recoverable today. On the other hand, the report underestimates the actual number of wildlife protection exemptions granted the energy industry for drilling in crucial winter range for ungulates and sage grouse and in other wildlife habitats.

While conservationists are pleased that the Bush Administration has finally admitted that environmental protections are not impeding energy development, there are serious concerns that policy makers will use the report to justify increased drilling in some of our most precious wildlands. The report is available online.