DNR rules no new lease sale information

The Alaska Department of Natural Resources has determined that responses to its call for new information for the state’s fall oil and gas lease sales did not provide information which justified supplements to final findings for the sales.

The sales, the 2013 Beaufort Sea, North Slope and North Slope Foothills areawide oil and gas lease sales, are tentatively scheduled for October.

In the decision, posted July 2, DNR Commissioner Dan Sullivan said “no substantial new information was received” in response to the March call for information, so no supplement to existing final findings is justified.

The decision discussed comments received from the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, Division of Air Quality, and from ConocoPhillips Alaska Inc.

DEC said industry has been gathering air pollutant data and doing related work and that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 10 has determined appropriate background values for Chukchi and Beaufort seas outer continental shelf permits, but the decision said “DEC’s comments do not contain or reference substantial new information that justifies a supplement to the current findings.”

ConocoPhillips Alaska said subdividing some North Slope tracts into parcels results in greater administrative burden for lessees and lessors and suggested the state return to offering tracts rather than parcels. DNR said this relates to the state’s administrative lease sale process, not substantial new information relevant to the final finding.

The company also said some mitigation measures in the North Slope final finding duplicate other requirements and create uncertainty because of vague wording, to which DNR said ConocoPhillips did not offer any instances in which it has been found noncompliant nor did it refer to studies or data which contain substantial new information, and said the commissioner may revisit mitigation measures during the next 10-year rewrite of the North Slope best interest finding.

—KRISTEN NELSON