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District court tosses ANWR appeal Judge rejects state of Alaska claim that Department of Interior must review state seismic survey plan for refuge coastal plain ALAN BAILEY Petroleum News
Judge Sharon Gleason of the federal District Court in Alaska has rejected an appeal by the state of Alaska against the U.S. Department of the Interior’s refusal to review a state plan to conduct a 3-D seismic program on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Following years of lobbying by Alaska policymakers anxious to see oil and gas exploration in the coastal plain of the refuge, in May 2013 the state administration under then-Gov. Sean Parnell proposed a state and federally funded exploration program to better understand the oil and gas resources in the region. Then, following rejection of this proposal, the state applied for a special use permit to conduct a 3-D survey in the coastal plan. After Interior said that it lacked the authority to approve the state’s plan, the state sued Interior Secretary Sally Jewell over Interior’s decision. Judge Gleason has now found in favor of Jewell.
ANILCA At the core of the case is the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, the act that in 1980 established the present-day Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Section 1002 of ANILCA designated 1.5 million acres of the coastal plain region of the refuge as warranting investigation for potential oil and gas development. This section of the act has led to the coastal plain of the refuge being referred to as the 1002 area.
ANILCA gave the secretary of the Interior the authority to approve certain exploration activities, including seismic surveying, within the 1002 area in order to evaluate the area’s oil and gas potential. The act also required Interior to submit a report to Congress on the oil and gas potential of the 1002 area, on the natural environment of the area and on the potential impacts on the environment of oil and gas exploration and development. The act also required a recommendation on whether further exploration, possibly leading to oil and gas development, should be permitted in the area.
In April 1987 Interior submitted the required report to Congress - the report included a recommendation that there should be an oil and gas leasing program in the 1002 area. However, Congress has never acted to authorize a program of this type, and the question of oil and gas exploration in the refuge has remained in limbo to the present day.
Time limits But, while ANILCA specified a deadline for Interior to file the required 1002 area report, the act did not spell out any specific timeframe within which exploration activities must be conducted. And, so, the state of Alaska, in filing is seismic survey plan, claimed that Interior still can legally review exploration plans.
Interior has, however, interpreted the wording of the act to mean that the approved exploration activities were intended as a means of gathering information for the report to Congress. On that basis, Interior’s authority to review exploration plans for the 1002 area expired in 1987, when the report to Congress was submitted, the agency has argued.
Judge Gleason has agreed that there is ambiguity in the wording of ANILCA over the intended time period within which refuge exploration activities can be reviewed. But, citing legal precedent, Gleason said that the court must accede to the expertise of a government agency in interpreting the intended meaning of a statute, provided that the agency’s interpretation is reasonable. In this case, Interior’s long-standing interpretation of ANILCA meets that reasonableness criterion and is upheld by the court, Gleason said.
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