Energy Town Hall

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Question of the Week

Why should MMS make offshore areas more available for exploration and production?

Why should the U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS) make offshore areas available for exploration and production in its next five-year plan?
— Michael, Bethesda, MD

If recent events have taught us anything, it is that our nation must develop energy supplies right here in America. This cannot be done by denying access, as we have done for too many years, to much of the country's offshore oil and gas resources. The federal government has placed 85 percent of the OCS acreage off the lower 48 states off limits to domestic oil and natural gas exploration and production. These offshore areas are home to huge, untapped resources of oil and natural gas that are crucial to keeping our economy and our country going strong. The undiscovered federal OCS resources currently off limits that could be recovered with today's sophisticated technology are estimated to be 18 billion barrels of oil and 77 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, according to the U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS). The resources expected to be found in these areas represent enough natural gas to heat 15 million households using natural gas for more than 77 years. And, it is enough oil to produce the gasoline needed to power over 20 million cars and the heating oil for 956,000 households for 30 years.

Further, these estimates may be conservative, since the areas are largely unexplored and the estimates have not benefited from the use of new seismic and computer modeling technology. The more an area is explored, the more its resource estimates may increase. For example, the MMS estimates of undiscovered oil resources for the Central and Western Gulf of Mexico increased from 9.27 billion barrels of oil in 1987 to 45 billion barrels of oil in 2006 - an increase nearly 500 percent over the original estimate. This was a result of greater familiarity with the area and, most importantly, new technologies employed by the industry to find and produce potential deposits.

Energy producers' commitment to responsible exploration and production and their use of state-of-the-art technology allows them to explore for and produce oil and natural gas, while protecting the environment. Offshore facility performance was severely tested when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita roared through the heart of the Gulf of Mexico. Almost 3,000 offshore platforms were in the direct path of the hurricanes. Some experienced 5-6 hours of sustained winds of 170 miles per hour (mph) with gusts over 200 mph. Production was shut down, platforms were evacuated but production restarted without any loss of life and without any significant offshore spills.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration continues to point out that oil and natural gas will be an essential part of this nation’s energy future for decades to come. Opening all available domestic resources to safe and environmentally responsible development would significantly boost U.S. supplies of oil and natural gas; increase the nation's energy security; add more well-paying American jobs; help with our balance of payments and economic growth during a time of recessionary fears and bring billions of dollars into the Treasury instead of sending them abroad.

There is no doubt that we need secure, affordable domestic oil and natural gas produced right here in America. This is essential to America's economic growth, energy security and way of life. Oil and natural gas heat and cool our homes, fuel cars and trucks, help farmers with affordable fertilizers - and are used to make products we use daily, from computers to medicines and medical equipment to lightweight parts for cars and airplanes.

The MMS should make expanded US oil and natural gas production a high priority. We need to open areas beyond the Central and Western Gulf of Mexico to responsible energy development.

MMS should make ALL offshore areas available for exploration and production in the next five-year plan. MMS:

• Should open all planning areas currently off limits to oil and natural gas development including:
• East Coast and especially those areas in the South Atlantic region - such as Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia;
• Open the remaining "Sale 181," including the northern segment commonly known as the "Stovepipe";
• Make available for leasing other areas in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico, which is expected to hold significant resources;
• West Coast
• Should not place restrictions on leasing in those areas already included in the current 5-year plan such as:
• Western and Central Gulf of Mexico
• North Aleutian Basin
• Beaufort Sea
• Chukchi Sea
• Cook Inlet

Developing new supplies of oil and clean-burning natural gas in America is essential to economic growth and our nation's energy security.

Return to Newest Question

Previous Questions

• Why are we not going after the extensive oil supplies within U.S. control?
• How will tax increases on the oil and natural gas impact industry workers?
• How will tax increases on the oil and natural gas industry impact consumers?
• How Can Energy Policies Contribute to Economic Stimulus?
• What's the real story with idle leases?
• Why should MMS make offshore areas more available for exploration and production?
• Why Aren't Leased Lands Producing Oil?
• Is America Running Out of Oil?
• Where Does U.S. Oil Go?
• What does the vote on the House energy bill mean?
• What is the industry doing to meet the new ethanol requirements?
• What's Going On with the Bans on Offshore Drilling?