As Gas Prices Rise

Interior Department Blocks 61 More Oil and Gas Leases
By Steve Everleyleases
In yet another example of the U.S. government blocking the development of affordable and reliable American energy, the Bureau of Land Management agreed last Friday to suspend sixty-one oil and gas leases in Montana.

The BLM's decision came after a lengthy litigation process: The Western Environmental Law Center filed a federal lawsuit in 2008 claiming that the BLM did not consider the potential climate change impacts of oil and gas development in the area when it sold the leases.

After two years of fighting the lawsuit in court, the BLM agreed last week to settle with WELC by just suspending all of the leases.

The suspension comes just over a year after Interior Secretary Ken Salazar voided 77 oil and gas leases in Utah.

This latest anti-energy decision, however, is apparently part of a broader trend in Montana: Yesterday Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer personally asked Salazar to cancel several other oil and gas leases covering some 200,000 acres in the state.

According to the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, Montana oil and gas production generated more than $25 million in royalties in 2008 alone, a hefty sum for a state expected to face a more than $60 million budgetary shortfall by June 2011.