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Murkowski promotes OCS revenue sharing
Alan Bailey Petroleum News
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, has introduced the Domestic Energy Security Act of 2009, a bill that would grant coastal states a 37.5 percent stake in all rents, royalties and bonuses from oil and gas activities on the federal outer continental shelf. In Alaska, the state would receive 47 percent of these revenue sharing funds and Alaska Native regional and village corporations would share 33 percent of the funds, while 20 percent of the funds would go to coastal borough and community governments.
Currently, a similar 37.5 percent revenue sharing arrangement only applies to four states bordering the Gulf of Mexico.
The new bill would also require any oil produced on the OCS of the Beaufort Sea, the Chukchi Sea and Norton Sound to be transported to onshore facilities by pipeline, to protect whales and other marine mammals “vital to the cultural and subsistence needs of Alaska Natives,” Murkowski’s press office said. The bill would also open parts of the eastern Gulf of Mexico to offshore oil and gas development.
Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., is co-sponsoring the bill.
Balance of concerns “This bipartisan bill will serve as the foundation for Alaska and other states to balance local economic and environmental concerns with national energy security,” Murkowski said. “Considering the economic and energy challenges we as a nation face, now is the time to get this right.”
Murkowski is the ranking Republican member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
The North Slope Borough, which provided input to the drafting of the bill, expressed satisfaction with the provision to mandate shipping offshore oil to land by pipeline rather than tanker, saying that broken ice conditions can threaten shipping routes with little warning and that a tanker accident in the Beaufort or Chukchi seas would prove devastating to the marine environment and to the way of life of the North Slope Inupiat people.
“Offshore development continues to be a source of great concern for the borough,” said borough Mayor Edward Itta. “Oil spill prevention and response are virtually impossible in our arctic waters. Our residents have always depended, and continue to depend, on marine mammals harvested for subsistence from the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas.”
And Itta said that he was pleased with the proposal to share federal revenues with communities directly affected by offshore oil and gas exploration and development.
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