Suit filed against state’s first Cook Inlet areawide lease sale

Trustees for Alaska, an environmental law firm, filed April 7 in Anchorage Superior Court for an injunction against the state’s April 21 Cook Inlet areawide oil and gas lease sale. Trustees had filed suit in March on its behalf and that of six other organizations, challenging the state’s decision to offer oil and gas leases on 4.2 million acres in and around Cook Inlet.

The suit argues that acreage around the mouths of 15 upper Cook Inlet rivers should be withdrawn from the sale to protect declining beluga whale populations.

Ken Boyd, director of the state Division of Oil and Gas, said April 7 that holding the lease sale as scheduled would not affect whales because state permits would have to be issued before any drilling took place.

“If somebody determined that oil and gas activity was a problem, we believe it can be mitigated,” Boyd said. Among possible mitigation measures are drilling offshore tracts from onshore drill pads, rather than from platforms, he said.

Stakeholder process for sale

An 11-member stakeholder group represented tourism, private property owners; the oil industry; Native corporations; Native tribal councils; oil and gas support industries; environmental organizations; commercial fishing; and sports fishing. The group was able to reach full consensus on a number of items and Commissioner John Shively of the Department of Natural Resources adopted consensus recommendations which did not require legislative action: longer public comment period; hearing panel approach to public meetings; maps improved to show more clearly which lands were included in the sale; changes and additions to the test of the state’s best interest finding.

—The Associated Press contributed to this story