On March 17, 2015, Secretary Jewell presented what was billed as a “major speech” to describe her vision of a “balanced prosperous energy future” at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Directly tying the U.S. “energy transformation” to the recovered...
On Tuesday, February 10, 2015, Utah Governor Gary Herbert signed an executive order directing state agencies to implement additional state-level protection measures aimed heading off a potential federal listing of the sage grouse as “threatened” or “endangered” under...
In the 2015 Appropriations Bill (Cromnibus), via a rider, Congress prohibited Interior from writing or issuing any final listing rule under Section 4 of the Endangered Species Act (“ESA”) for several species of grouse. It now looks like that action could result in...
In a new twist in the ongoing debate between states and the federal government over the management of wildlife, the Nevada Association of Counties sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (“FWS”), arguing that the highly publicized and controversial 2011 settlement of...
At the end of September 2014, BLM released the proposed rule to create a competitive leasing process for solar and wind energy development on public lands. While most of the proposed rule relates to the renewable energy right-of-way (“ROW”) procedures under the...
As part of a suite of federal oil and gas leasing reforms introduced by Secretary Salazar in 2010, the BLM introduced the concept of master leasing plans (“MLPs”). The MLP is a federal land use planning tool that allows the BLM to amend a governing resource management...