BLM Announces Results of Review of Oil Shale Research Nominations

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) today announced the names of eight applicants whose proposals for oil shale research development and demonstration (RD&D) leases have been judged eligible for continued consideration. The oil shale program is part of the BLM’s ongoing effort to provide the Nation with secure, reliable, affordable energy sources by boosting domestic energy production.

The companies that filed the eight applications are Chevron Shale Oil Company; EGL Resources, Inc.; Exxon Mobil Corporation; Oil-Tech, Inc.; Oil Shale Exploration, LLC; and Shell Frontier Oil & Gas, whose three separate nominations were all judged eligible for further consideration.

The eight proposals were among 20 nominations the BLM received in response to a call for proposals published in the Federal Register in June 2005 for 160-acre RD&D leases on public lands in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. Those nominations were evaluated by an interdisciplinary team of representatives from the BLM, the Departments of Energy and Defense, and the governments of the three States.

The next step in the evaluation process will be to complete an environmental analysis under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of the eight proposals.

“Each of these proposals shows potential for advancing knowledge of oil shale recovery technology, evidence of economic viability, and adequate means for managing the environmental impact of oil shale development,” said BLM Director Kathleen Clarke. “NEPA analysis will further ensure that oil shale development on Federal lands is conducted with environmental and economic responsibility.”

Clarke emphasized that no RD&D lease will be awarded without certainty that the technology used will operate at environmentally acceptable levels. She added that States and local communities will continue to be an integral part of the evaluation process.

The parcels nominated by Chevron, EGL, Exxon Mobil, and Shell are located on public lands in Colorado. The proposals submitted by Oil-Tech and Oil Shale Exploration, LLC involve parcels in Utah. Each nomination identifies the 160 acres allowed in the call for RD&D proposals, along with an additional contiguous area of 4,960 acres to be reserved for a preferential right to convert to a commercial lease at a future time after additional BLM review.

Six of the proposals involve in-situ (in-place) retorting, which does not permanently modify the land surface. All current methods for processing oil shale require heating the rock to mimic the geologic processes that produced conventional deposits of oil and natural gas. NEPA analysis will help the BLM determine whether current technologies will result in less surface disturbance than earlier methods.

The United States holds significant oil shale resources underlying a total area of 16,000 square miles. This represents the largest known concentration of oil shale in the world and holds an estimated 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil – enough to meet U.S. demand for oil at current levels for 110 years. More than 70 percent of American oil shale is on Federal land, primarily in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming.

The BLM has also initiated a programmatic EIS (PEIS) to support development of commercial oil shale and tar sands leasing on public lands, as the Energy Policy Act of 2005 requires. Information about the PEIS is available on the project Website: http://ostseis.anl.gov. To the extent possible, information available from the RD&D leasing program will be incorporated into the PEIS.

The BLM manages 261 million surface acres located mostly in 12 Western States, including Alaska – more land than any other Federal agency. With a budget of about $1.8 billion, the Bureau also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the U.S. Managing these lands gives the BLM a central role in implementing the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Acting as steward of numerous energy resources – coal, oil and gas, geothermal, hydropower, solar, wind, and biomass energy resources – the BLM carries out a multiple-use mission, one that sustains the health and productivity of the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations.

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