Reaction: Oil Change International responds to U.S. Interior Department oil & gas leasing reform report

Today, the United States Department of the Interior released its long-awaited review of the federal oil and gas leasing program.

Rather than proposing an end to new oil and gas leasing and permitting, as candidate Joe Biden promised, the report largely rehashed previous assessments of the program and proposed minor changes to increase revenues from oil and gas drilling on federal lands and waters.

In response, Collin Rees, U.S. Program Manager at Oil Change International, released the following statement:

"Interior's leasing report reads as if it was written in the 1990s, and does little more than confirm what advocates and other branches of government have been saying for decades. The report is woefully inadequate and contains almost no new insights, despite arriving more than six months later than promised.

"The government's royalty rates and bonding requirements are far too low and lead to public money subsidizing Big Oil's profits while our federal lands and waters suffer egregious harm. But President Biden promised to end the leasing program entirely due to its deadly threat to the climate. Interior's recommendations fall far short of that goal and ring particularly hollow days after the largest lease sale in U.S. history.

"Secretary Haaland and President Biden must end all federal leasing and permits for oil and gas extraction. Anything less is unacceptable and a damning failure of their climate promises and responsibility to future generations."