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BLM’s new Alaska head not new to oil and gas issues, controversies Francis “Fran” Cherry, 30-year agency veteran, has worked on industry issues in western states, Washington, D.C. Kristen Nelson PNA News Editor
The Bureau of Land Management’s new Alaska state director, Francis “Fran” Cherry Jr., has been with the U.S. Department of the Interior agency for more than 30 years. Cherry has had considerable involvement with oil and gas, beginning with his first job with the bureau in Vernal, Utah.
And, he told PNA in early October, he looks forward to getting all of the players to the table to talk out energy issues and get to a solution.
Cherry graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in zoology, but it was his minor in botany which interested BLM when the agency him as a range conservationist in 1968. And it was at the Red Wash oil field in Utah that Cherry began working oil and gas and production issues.
The bureau sent him to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin for a master’s degree in urban and regional planning, and then Cherry was assigned as chief of the branch of planning in Colorado.
It was, he said, during the height of the 1974-80 energy crisis. He was heavily involved in planning efforts and National Environmental Policy Act efforts for coal, oil and gas, minerals and land use planning for oil shale development.
To Washington in 1980 In 1980, Cherry was selected as liaison between the bureau’s coal and minerals groups in Washington, D.C., and state governments and other federal agencies on big energy projects under way such as rights-of-way and coal projects.
He worked a lot of exotic programs — including solar power, wind power and biomass conversion. When the bureau decided it wanted to lease oil shale and needed regulations, Cherry was selected because he’d written land use plans for oil shale.
Then tar sand legislation was passed and Cherry wrote regulations for that and then for energy solid leaseable programs including potash and phosphate.
Multi-use minerals issues Cherry’s energy involvement continued in his next assignment as district manager in New Mexico where there were conflicts between oil and gas operators and potash miners on federal lands in the Permian Basin. The oil and gas industry felt potash miners were keeping millions and millions of barrels out of production; the potash miners were afraid oil and gas developers would let gas seep into the workings and kill miners. The issues were resolved in a new secretarial order which dictated how the industries would share the field.
Cherry’s last assignment before Alaska was as associate state director in Montana, where the bureau manages 8.5 million acres of surface and 45 million acres of subsurface, including coal and oil and gas.
BLM has downhole responsibility In Alaska, BLM has overall downhole responsibility, Cherry said, even in areas like the Kenai Peninsula where surface federal land is managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. BLM inspectors based in Anchorage check on drilling activity.
In the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, where BLM has overall responsibility, site work is complete for drilling activity this winter.
“We’ve seen all the drill locations,” he said and site specific environmental assessments are under way.
The environmental assessments, Cherry said, make sure that what is planned is within the parameters of the environmental impact statement and include an archaeological clearance and a final look for threatened and endangered species.
BLM will also go out as well work is under way and have inspectors on site when the well is spud and at most critical stages, such as circulation tests and plugging.
Pipeline renewal A big project for BLM in Alaska over the next few years will be renewal of the right-of-way for the trans-Alaska pipeline.
And that’s not just NEPA, Cherry said.
“There are a lot of parts to the TAPS renewal,” he said. “A lot of folks just think of it as doing the NEPA documentation. There’s a lot of controversy over whether it should be an EIS or an EA. We’ve settled that for the bureau’s standpoint and we’re going to go ahead with an EIS, primarily because of the level of controversy.
“Not because we think that it’s going to go away… but there’s a lot of controversy with it and a lot of folks that want to see things run a little bit differently or that sort of thing.”
But the EIS, Cherry said, is just one part.
“The law itself requires a lot of compliance work. They have to certify the pipeline’s in good working condition now.”
Cherry said there are four primary things in the renewal:
“One is the federal side of the pipeline renewal effort… That’s the reissuance of the right-of-way with its stipulations… Then the state has their same component of that that… Then there’s some coastal zone management issues… (handled) out of the Joint Pipeline Office. … And then the fourth element is the NEPA documentation.”
NEPA, Cherry said, doesn’t really do anything, “it’s a disclosure document.” The actual renewal will be a grant and lease — and that’s where enforcement comes he, he said, because the stipulations are attached to the grant and lease.
When it all starts Cherry said the pipeline owners will probably first submit a letter of intent indicating when an application will be submitted.
“The actual application will contain a lot of information,” he said. The Trans-Alaska Pipeline Authorization Act requires that the owners submit documentation — their own compliance efforts, their environmental data — and it’s all part of the application.
BLM will be working through what information is needed with the owners, reviewing what is submitted, and won’t begin its work until the application is accepted as complete. The bureau will also be using information collected by the agencies through the years.
In addition to the Joint Pipeline Office, we’ll probably assemble a small staff just to do the NEPA documentation, Cherry said. He said the agency was analyzing its options right now on the best way to handle the EIS.
The process will be time consuming. Cherry said 18 months is the absolute fastest time for an EIS — and that’s where there’s no controversy — and the EIS is just part of the renewal process. The parts of the process will all be worked together.
But preparatory work is all that can be done until the application is received, Cherry said.
All players to the table “I really enjoy this kind of a challenge, and helping to bring all of the players to the table,” Cherry said. “I’ve kind of worked in these kinds of energy issues for a lot of my career with the bureau and a lot can be accomplished when you get all of the partners to sit down at the table and talk things out and get to a solution. And that’s really what I enjoy.
“And at the same time, while we’re getting there, we’re protecting the environment, sustaining the health of the land…
“But we have an obligation to the nation and to the folks in Alaska to preserve that, maintain it, in the best condition that it can be maintained. And I’d like to think that, talking about the pipeline in specific, we’ve been pretty good guardians of that. There really have been no major (pipeline) spills — there’s nothing up there that hasn’t been cleaned up, the small ones that we’ve had.
“So as far as I can tell, it’s working pretty good. But there’s a lot of other things up there and there’s so much potential still in Alaska to do more and more.”
“Our goal is to take care of those public lands and have them ready for future generations,” he said. “Plus we have an obligation for multiple use and sustained yield. So oil and gas production is part of that mix.”
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