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U.S. regulators are trying to rewrite guidelines on how to protect endangered species in the Gulf of Mexico before a December deadline, potentially threatening oil and gas production in a region that provides 2 million barrels per day of oil, or about 15% of U.S. crude output, according to Bloomberg. reported this week.
A U.S. district court ruled last month that the U.S. government’s flagship Endangered Species Act analysis of oil and gas activity in the Gulf — a “biological opinion” published in 2020 detailing how drilling, pipeline construction and other operations could endanger protected species in the region — was flawed and failed to adequately assess the risks they face from oil spills and ship strikes.
If regulators fail to complete their reviews by the Dec. 20 deadline, and if the courts or Congress do not step in to provide more time, existing oil and gas operations that rely on the assessments could grind to a halt.
Environmental groups challenged the biological opinion four years ago, and last month the judge sided with them, throwing out the biological opinion and sending it back to the National Marine Fisheries Service for rewriting.
Without a valid biological opinion by the deadline, energy regulators could be forced to consult on hundreds or perhaps thousands of decisions a year, according to data they provided to the court.
The issue is causing anxiety for some Gulf operators, who are concerned not only about delays in government approvals but also about the viability of existing work authorized under the biological opinion invalidated by the court, Bloomberg reported.
At stake are operations as varied as ship traffic supplying offshore platforms to continuous production at long-permitted wells, the report said.
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