BLM-Alaska OverviewBud C. Cribley

BLM-Alaska State DirectorWestern Interstate Region

Board of Directors MeetingMay 21, 2014

At 586,400 square miles (365 million acres), Alaska is larger than these eastern states combined

Alaska-Lower 48 Size Comparison

Field Offices in Alaska

BoundariesBLM

Jurisdictional

BLM-Alaska Programs• Monitoring

• Permitting

• Restoration

• National Landscape Conservation System

• Management of public land records

•Mining

BLM-Alaska Programs• Programs Unique to Alaska:⎻Land Conveyance & Survey⎻Subsistence⎻Alaska Fire Service⎻National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska⎻Trans-Alaska Pipeline Oversight

Land Conveyance & Survey Program

• BLM’s largest land transfer program – 150 million acres

• Conveyed area size of CA to State of Alaska

• Area roughly size of State of Washington to Native Corps

BLM OversightTrans-Alaska Pipeline

Trans-Alaska Pipeline/utility corridor

• Oversees and monitors one of the largest, longest pipelines in world

• 48-inch diameter, 800 miles long

NPR-A• 22.8 million acres

• Largest contiguous block of federally managed land in US

• Roughly size of Indiana

• High profile – oil reserve, rich environmental landscape

NPR-A

Legacy Wells

Natural oil seeps near Simpson Core Test #31

NPR-A

NPR-A

NPR-A

NPR-A

National Issues

• Hydraulic Fracturing Rule

• Venting and Flaring

• Mitigation

• Fire

• Sage Grouse

Hydraulic Fracturing Rule• After dozens of meetings, thousands

of comments, new path forward⎻ More than a million comments received

• About 90% of wells on federal and Indian land fracked nationwide

• Proposed rule:⎻ Updated regs⎻ Establish baseline environmental safeguards⎻ Requires public disclosure of chemicals used⎻ Improves assurances of wellbore integrity⎻ Requires water mgmt plans

Venting and Flaring• Capturing natural gas from oil & gas

projects⎻ Reduce greenhouse gas⎻ Capture for productive use, economics (GAO estimated

$2 million lost per year in royalties)

• New rulemaking needed - regs date back to 1979

• DOI and BLM reaching out now to state and tribal governments, others for input on new regs

• New regs would establish appropriate standards to prevent waste and promote conservation of produced oil & gas

Mitigation• BLM’s new approach to mitigation for

renewable energy development – landscape perspective

• Regional approach:⎻ Identify priority opportunities across landscapes⎻ Achieve highest mitigation benefit

• Released draft Regional Mitigation manual section last June – interim policy guiding mitigation planning for land use authorizations

Fire• Fire season severity has increased:

⎻ Decreased snow pack⎻ Increased temperatures⎻ Longer droughts

• Longer fire seasons, bigger fires (doubled in acreage over last 3 decades)

• 2014 Budget (CR) - $36 million to DOI for fire suppression

• 2015 Admin budget proposal – special disaster relief cap adjustment for use when firefighting costs exceed budgets

Greater Sage Grouse Planning

• March 2010 – FWS “warranted but precluded” finding

• BLM’s Planning Strategy – complete land use plans by end of 2014, give FWS time to evaluate before court-ordered final listing decision in 2015

• In effort to prevent listing, BLM evaluating SG conservation across 68 planning areas

• Stakes are high – hundreds of thousands of sqare miles of sagebrush habitat throughout West

Greater Sage Grouse Impacts

• Impacts to Energy development, Recreation, Livestock grazing, Fire management

• Proactive approach with Forest Service to maintain wide range of options, reduce regulatory burdens

• Ultimate goal to eliminate need to list

• Appreciate the work of many of you here as we implement conservation measures into plans

• Strong partnerships with counties, states, including Western Gov’s Task Force

Questions?