This Fact Sheet explains in plain words the dangerous OCS offshore drilling provisions contained in HR 7, which can be used in drafting letters and added into the context of comprehensive fact sheets also covering the Arctic Refuge drilling and other issues. Feel free to use and adapt this as needed. Richard Charter

Florida’s Gulf Coast:
Waives the bipartisan agreement reached in 2006 called the “Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act” (GOMESA) which opened vast new areas to exploration and, in exchange, guaranteed necessary protections for the Military Mission Line in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico. HR 7 ignores this compromise and would instead require new lease sales of not less than fifty contiguous tracts within GOMESA during 2013, again in 2014, and again during 2015. Should the Secretary of Defense identify any military areas in conflict with the proposed leasing plan, for each and every single tract removed from leasing for Department of Defense purposes, two other tracts would be substituted for leasing, regardless of other values.

California:
Requires offshore drilling on tracts in sensitive Southern California waters to be conducted from shore or from existing offshore platforms using the very risky application of directional drilling, a technique particularly vulnerable to the same kinds of “cementing” problems that contributed to the BP Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. States’ rights under the Coastal Zone Management Act would be waived for all related drilling activities off of Southern California.

Off of Northern California, Oregon, Washington, and along the Atlantic coast, requires that at least fifty-percent of the coastal tracts in any OCS Planning Area considered most likely to have petroleum potential be offered for lease in each and every subsequent “Five-Year OCS Leasing Program”, with no consideration of fisheries values or local economic concerns. Another fifty-percent of any remaining such tracts required to be offered in the next Five-Year Program, continuing until entire planning area is leased.

Virginia:
Requires that lease sale 220 along the mid-Atlantic be held no later than one year after enactment of this Act, and that the present seaward boundaries now associated with the Commonwealth of Virginia be arbitrarily expanded northward and southward to encompass federal waters now associated with North Carolina and Maryland. Should the Secretary of Defense identify any military areas in conflict with the proposed leasing plan, for each and every single tract removed from leasing for Department of Defense purposes, two other tracts would be substituted for leasing, regardless of other values.

Bristol Bay, Alaska:
Requires that the Secretary of Interior conduct Lease Sale 214 in Bristol Bay, Alaska within one year of enactment, amidst the largest runs of wild salmon on earth, in waters supplying 40% of the total U.S. fish catch including halibut, red king crab, Pacific cod, and pollock and supporting billions in sustainable annual economic activity.