Land Management Bureau October 7, 2005 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This document provides notice that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) intends to prepare a Resource Management Plan (RMP) amendment to address offering the sale of public land within Mineral County, Nevada not currently identified for disposal.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) will file the plat of survey of the lands described below in the BLM-Eastern States, Springfield, Virginia, 30 calendar days from the date of publication in the Federal Register.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) proposes to amend regulations published in the Federal Register on Friday, June 30, 2000 (65 FR 40953). The existing regulations allowed certain Alaska Native veterans another opportunity to apply for a Native allotment under the repealed Native Allotment Act of 1906. This proposed rulemaking would delete the requirement that veteran applicants must post the land by marking all corners of the ground with their name and address prior to filing an application with the BLM. Enforcement of the posting rule for allotments adjudicated under the 1906 Act was previously waived by an Assistant Secretary. Therefore, the posting requirement is deemed unnecessary for Native veteran allotment cases.

Under the provisions of 30 U.S.C. 188(d) and (e), and 43 CFR 3108.2-3(a) and (b)(1), the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) received a petition for reinstatement of oil and gas lease WYW136681 from Redstone Resources, Inc., Preston Reynolds & Co., Inc., and CH4 Energy, LLC for lands in Campbell County, Wyoming. The petition was filed on time and was accompanied by all the rentals due since the date the lease terminated under the law.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM or ``we'') is issuing this interim final rule to amend regulations for the leasing of hydrocarbons, except coal, gilsonite and oil shale, in special tar sand areas. In this rule, BLM amends our regulations to respond to provisions of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 that allow separate oil and gas leases and tar sand leases in special tar sand areas, specify several oil and gas leasing practices that apply to tar sand leases, increase the maximum size for combined hydrocarbon leases and tar sand leases, and set the minimum acceptable bid for tar sand leases at $2.00 per acre. The law requiring these changes also requires that this rule be published as a final rule within 45 days of enactment. This is an interim final rule. Although the rule is effective upon publication, there is a 60-day comment period that starts on the date of publication. After the comment period, we will review the comments and may issue a further final rule making any necessary changes.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is issuing this final rule to amend its mineral resources regulations to increase certain fees and to impose new fees to cover BLM's costs of processing documents relating to its minerals programs. The new fees include costs of actions such as environmental studies performed by BLM, lease applications, name changes, corporate mergers, lease consolidations and reinstatements, and other processing-related costs. BLM established some fixed fees and some fees on a case-by-case basis. BLM based these fee changes on statutory authorities, which authorize us to charge for our processing costs, and on policy guidance from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the Department of the Interior (DOI) requiring BLM to charge these fees. This rule also responds to recommendations issued in audit reports by the DOI's Office of Inspector General (OIG). The final rule also reflects changes to the proposed rule required by the Energy Policy Act of 2005.