Press Release
SALT LAKE CITY—On Nov. 19, 2013, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Utah will offer 35 parcels covering 44,021 acres in the Price and Vernal Field Offices at its quarterly oil and gas lease sale. After thorough review and consideration, the BLM Utah decided to defer 99,960 acres from the sale to provide additional time to address concerns including cultural resources, sensitive species, and potential impacts to the Old Spanish Trail.
“We are committed to responsible development of energy resources on Utah’s public lands,” said BLM-Utah State Director Juan Palma. “We are deferring these particular lands from the upcoming sale to provide for additional review and consideration of the potential impacts leasing poses to natural and cultural resources.”
To date in Calendar Year 2013, the BLM has held 26 of 30 scheduled lease sales around the nation. Sales so far this year have offered 1,793 parcels covering 5,386,277 acres; 1,103 of the parcels, encompassing 944,840 acres, have been sold, generating nearly $185 million in bonus bids and rental fees for the U.S. Treasury and the states and counties where the leases are located.
In Fiscal Year (FY) 2012, the State of Utah received more than $164 million from royalties, rentals and bonus bid payments for federal minerals, including oil and gas. The BLM-Utah State Office currently administers approximately 3.8 million acres of public mineral estate that is leased for oil and gas development. The extraction of these resources and their introduction into the market generated more than $6.5 billion in direct economic benefits and more than $9.7 billion in total economic impacts in FY2012.
To learn more about oil and gas leasing on federal lands please visit:
https://www.blm.gov/ut/st/en/
For further information on the deferral please contact Megan Crandall at (801)539-4020. Persons who use a telecommunications device for the deaf (TDD) may call the Federal Information Relay Service (FIRS) at 1-800-877-8339to leave a message or question for the above individual. The FIRS is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Replies are provided during normal business hours.