Bureau of Ocean Energy Management June 16, 2014 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

Section 18 of the OCS Lands Act (43 U.S.C. 1344) requires the Department of the Interior (DOI) to invite and solicit information from interested and affected parties during the preparation of a Five Year OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program (Five Year Program). The current Five Year Program became effective on August 27, 2012, and will expire on August 26, 2017 (2012-2017 Program). BOEM intends to prepare a new Five Year Program to succeed the current one and cover the period from July 2017 to June 2022 (2017-2022 Program). Section 18 of the OCS Lands Act requires the completion of a multi- step process of public consultation and analysis before the Secretary of the Interior (Secretary) may approve a new Five Year Program. The process required by section 18 of the OCS Lands Act includes the following steps: (1) Issuance of a Request for Information and Comments (RFI); (2) development of a Draft Proposed Program (DPP), a Proposed Program (PP), and a Proposed Final Program (PFP); and (3) Secretarial approval of a Final Program. During the development of the new Five Year Program, BOEM will prepare a Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS), pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), 43 U.S.C. 4321 et seq., in order to inform program decisions. The public will have opportunities to comment on the DPP, the Draft PEIS, and the PP.