02.08.16

Grijalva, Lowenthal, Tsongas Lead Letter Praising Proposed Interior Department Oil and Gas Rule, Asking for Quick Finalization

Washington, D.C. – Ranking Member Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and 56 fellow Members of Congress sent a letter to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell today commending her on the Department of the Interior’s (DOI’s) newly proposed rules for overseeing oil and gas operations on National Park Service (NPS) and Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) lands and asking the Department to finalize them as soon as possible.

The letter – led by Reps. Alan Lowenthal (D-Calif.) and Niki Tsongas (D-Mass.), the ranking members of the Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources and the Subcommittee on Federal Lands, respectively – follows the Obama administration’s announcements last year of strict new regulations for oil and gas companies operating on or under national parks and wildlife refuges. The rules will help protect wildlife, the environment, and the American taxpayer and ensure that we no longer turn a blind eye to harmful oil and gas activities in fragile and protected areas.

Under current NPS regulations, most operations in national parks are needlessly exempt from oversight, while outdated 50-year-old FWS regulations have led to refuges that are “littered with orphaned or abandoned oil and gas infrastructure,” in the words of the Department of the Interior’s Office of Inspector General. Even worse, insufficient or nonexistent bonding requirements mean that the American taxpayer is on the hook for cleaning up industry’s trash on some of our most treasured lands.

The letter highlights the need for stronger cleanup bonding levels for potentially environmentally harmful extraction projects. It reads in part:

We are strongly supportive of the recent improvements proposed to NPS and FWS regulations, which would, among other things, remove the unnecessary NPS exemptions, establish clear and consistent permitting requirements for refuges, and establish bonding levels that would cover the full reclamation cost. These improvements are long overdue, and we commend both the NPS and FWS for moving forward to protect the lands under their purviews, which are entrusted to them on behalf of the American people.

The full letter, officially dated Feb. 9, is available at http://1.usa.gov/1Lcd4aY.

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