This October 2011 photo, shows the Perdido oil platform located about 200 miles south of Galveston, Texas, in the Gulf of Mexico. The Biden administration is proposing up to 10 oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and one in Alaska over the next five years. The announcement on Friday, July 1, 2022, said fewer lease sales or even zero could occur, with a final decision not due for months. (AP Photo / Jon Fahey)

This October 2011 photo, shows the Perdido oil platform located about 200 miles south of Galveston, Texas, in the Gulf of Mexico. The Biden administration is proposing up to 10 oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and one in Alaska over the next five years. The announcement on Friday, July 1, 2022, said fewer lease sales or even zero could occur, with a final decision not due for months. (AP Photo / Jon Fahey)

Biden offshore drilling proposal would allow up to 11 sales

Proposal includes up to 10 oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and 1 off the Alaska coast.

President Joe Biden’s administration on Friday proposed up to 10 oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and one off the Alaska coast over the next five years — going against the Democrat’s climate promises but scaling back a Trump-era plan that called for dozens of offshore drilling opportunities including in undeveloped areas.

Administration officials said fewer than 11 lease sales — or even no lease sales at all — could occur, with a final decision not due for months. New drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts would be blocked, after being considered under Trump.

The proposal brought backlash from both environmentalists — who accused Biden of betraying the climate cause — and oil industry officials and allies, who said it would do little to help counter high energy prices. Gasoline prices averaged $4.84 a gallon on Friday, a strain on commuters and a political albatross for Biden’s fellow Democrats going into the midterm elections. That has left the White House scrambling for solutions, including Biden’s call last week for suspension of the 18.4 cents a gallon federal gas tax.

The Interior Department had suspended lease sales in late January because of climate concerns but was forced to resume them by a U.S. district judge in Louisiana.

The Biden administration cited conflicting court rulings about that decision when it canceled the last scheduled lease sales in the Gulf and Alaska during the previous offshore leasing cycle. That prior five-year cycle, a program adopted under former President Barack Obama, expired on Thursday.

There will be a months-long gap before a new plan can be put in place. The oil industry and its allies say the delay could cause problems in planning new drilling and potentially lead to decreased oil production.

There’s unlikely to be an offshore lease sale until well into next year, said Frank Macchiarola, senior vice president of the American Petroleum Institute, the industry’s top lobbying group.

And, he said, administration officials “went out of their way to say” there might not be any lease sales at all.

“It’s very important for the administration to send a signal to the global oil markets that the United States is serious about increasing supply … for the long term,” he said, repeating a longtime claim by industry officials and Republicans that ties uncertainty over oil supply to high prices.

Biden in recent weeks has criticized oil producers and refiners for maximizing profits and making “more money than God,” rather than increasing production in response to higher prices as the economy recovers from the pandemic and feels the effects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The leasing announcement was a bitter disappointment to environmentalists and some Democrats who rallied around then-candidate Biden when he promised to end new drilling in federal lands and waters.

The proposal comes a day after the administration held its first onshore lease sales, drawing $22 million in an auction that gives energy companies drilling rights on about 110 square miles (285 square kilometers) in seven western states. The sales came despite the administration’s own findings that burning oil and gas from the parcels could cause billions of dollars in potential future climate damages.

“Our public lands and waters are already responsible for nearly a quarter of the country’s carbon pollution each year. Adding any new lease sales to that equation while the climate crisis is unfolding all around us is nonsensical,” said House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raul Grijalva, D-Arizona.

Cynthia Sartou, executive director of the environmental nonprofit Healthy Gulf, called the lease-sale plan “a huge loss for Gulf residents, American energy policy and the global climate.”

Moderate Democrat Joe Manchin, who chairs the Senate energy committee, welcomed the proposal as a chance “to get our leasing program back on track.”

“While Americans everywhere are suffering from record high gas prices and disruptions in the global oil market caused by (Russian leader Vladimir) Putin’s senseless war in Ukraine, the Department of the Interior hasn’t held any successful offshore lease sales since November 2020,” the West Virginia lawmaker said.

Every previous administration dating back to John F. Kennedy’s had held several lease sales by this point, Macchiarola said.

Under the Trump administration, Interior officials had proposed 47 sales, including 12 in the Gulf of Mexico, 19 in Alaska and nine off the Atlantic coast that were later withdrawn. Trump lost the 2020 election before the proposal was finalized.

The current format of holding Gulf-wide sales was put in place under Obama because of dwindling interest in offshore leases. Prior to that there had been decades of regional sales.

Friday’s announcement opens a 90-day public comment period, then a final plan must be submitted 60 days before it goes into effect.

The government held an offshore lease auction in the Gulf of Mexico in November that brought $192 million in bids. A court canceled that sale before the leases were issued.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland has said previously that the industry is “set” with the amount of drilling permits stockpiled and at its disposa l. She testified during a House hearing in April that the industry has about 9,000 permits that have been approved but are not being used.

Oil production has increased as the economy recovers from the coronavirus slowdown, but it’s still below pre-pandemic levels. Energy companies have been reluctant to ramp up production further, citing a shortage of workers and restraints from investors wary that today’s high prices won’t last.

Major oil companies reported surging profits in the first quarter and sent tens of billions of dollars in dividends to shareholders.

Athan Manuel of the Sierra Club said delaying offshore sales until next year “is an important step toward protecting communities and climate, and we urge the administration to finalize a plan that commits to no new offshore drilling leases, period.”

More in News

A male sea otter pup, estimated at 2 weeks old, was rescued near Homer and admitted to the Alaska SeaLife Center rehabilitation program on June 23, 2025, in Seward, Alaska. Photo courtesy of the Alaska SeaLife Center
Seward’s SeaLife Center admits 2 seal pups, 1 orphaned otter

The three pups join the Alaska SeaLife Center’s ‘growing’ patient list

Alaska Seaplane pilot Vance Tilley stands in front of the Piatus PC-12 in Klawock on June 23 during the inaugural trip of the new service between Juneau, Ketchikan and Klawock. (Photos by Gemini Waltz Media/courtesy Alaska Seaplane)
New Juneau-Ketchikan nonstop flight service launches

The flight leaves Juneau at 3:45 p.m., and the trip lasts 1 hour 25 minutes

Danial Roberts, an employee at Viking Lumber Company, looks out at lumber from a forklift in Klawock, Alaska. (Courtesy of Viking Lumber Company)
Threads of the Tongass: The future of pianos and the timber industry

Timber operators say they are in crisis and unique knowledge, products will be lost

Suicide Basin as of 10:01 a.m. on Thursday, July 10, 2025, taken by a U.S. Geological Survey camera at the basin entrance facing northeast, into the basin. (Screenshot from National Weather Service Juneau page)
Glacial lake outburst swells Salmon River near Hyder

The isolation of Salmon River limits the impact of flooding

Kahyl Dybdahl, left, and Bronze Chevis eat an egg sandwich breakfast before school at Dzantik’i Heeni Middle School on Wednesday, Sept. 6, 2017. (Michael Penn / Juneau Empire file photo)
School board allocates extra state funds

More state funds available, but funding issues and federal uncertainty abound

Max Webster stands with Lemon Creek Correctional Center staff in front of new control tower on Tuesday, July 9, 2025. (Natalie Buttner / Juneau Empire)
A towering accomplishment for new Eagle Scout

Max Webster honored at Firearms Training Center Control Tower ribbon-cutting ceremony

Andy Engstrom (left) uses bitcoin to buy lemonade and cookies from business owner Denali Schijvens (right) on Saturday, July 5, 2025. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire)
Alaska’s 1st Bitcoin conference held in Juneau

State leaders discuss integrating Bitcoin in Alaska energy, investment and universities

Most Read