The Interior Department’s decision to not move forward with the lease sale comes as gas prices soar.
Highlights
- The Biden administration has canceled one of the most high-profile oil and gas lease opportunities pending before the Interior Department.
- The decision comes at a challenging political moment, when gas prices are hitting painful new highs.
- The department also halted two leases under consideration for the Gulf of Mexico region because of “conflicting court rulings that impacted work on these proposed lease sales” The administration has previously canceled lease sales in Cook Inlet three times — in 2007, 2008, and 2011 — citing “lack of industry interest” at the time as the reason for scrapping the sales.
- The national average price of regular gas hit an all-time high of $4.40, according to AAA.