The
U.S.
National Park Service
(NPS) is a bureau of the U.S. Department of the Interior having responsibility
for managing and maintaining 417 areas – also referred as units – of national
significance, including national parks, monuments, battlefields, military
parks, historical parks, historic sites, lakeshores, seashores, recreation
areas, scenic rivers and trails. Those areas are part of the National Park
System and account for a total of 84 million acres within all 50 states, the
District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin
Islands.
As
part of the National Park System, the NPS is in charge of setting out policies
and regulations to protect and preserve the said areas under the authority of
the National Park Service Organic Act. Accordingly, in December 1978, the NPS
enacted specific regulations governing the exercise of non-federal oil and gas
rights in units of the National Park System codified at 36 CFR part 9, subpart B, and applied to all activities
associated with non-federal oil and gas development on NPS units “where access
is on, across, or through federally owned or controlled lands or waters.” Non-federal oil and gas rights would
encompass those rights owned by private parties, state and local governments,
or other entities underlying NPS units.
On
October 26, 2015, the NPS published to the Federal Register a proposed rule revisiting the codified
regulations of more than 37 years old in order to improve the efficiency and
effectiveness of the National Park System. The other purpose of the proposed
rule is to ensure NPS units adequate protection from increasing oil and gas
exploration and production. As stated in the Federal Register, the NPS has
recorded 534 non-federal oil and gas operations in a total of 12 units and
“[b]ased on the presence of split estates, exploration and production occurring
on adjacent and nearby lands, and likely increases in energy prices, NPS
expects that future non-federal oil and gas operations within park boundaries
could occur in up to 30 additional System units.”
On
November 4, 2016, the NPS published the final rule to protect national parks from
potential adverse impacts associated with non-federal oil and gas operations
located within the NPS units outside Alaska. The final rule became effective on
December 5, 2016.
One
of the main changes brought by the new rule concern the scope of application,
which has been extended to cover “non-federal oil or gas operations on lands or
waters within a System unit, regardless of the ownership or legislative
jurisdictional status of those lands or waters.” In addition, the NPS final
rule now requires operators to obtain a Temporary Access Permit or an
Operations Permit preceding any activities on NPS units. Prior to the enactment
of the new regulations, operators only needed to submit a proposed plan of
operations and financial assurance for approval. The bonding cap on financial
assurance set at $200,000 per operator, per System unit, was removed and, from
now on, the financial assurance will be calculated based on the reasonable
estimated cost of site reclamation. Furthermore, the NPS will not start
reviewing permit applications before operators can prove that they hold a valid
existing right to conduct oil and gas operations on NPS lands.
Another
important change is that the NPS final rule created new information
requirements for previously exempt operators, including operations that do not
require access on, across, or through federal lands and grandfathered
operations. The NPS explained that operators did not have to obtain an approved
NPS plan of operations and financial assurance prior to conducting its oil and
gas activities on NPS units, which resulted in adverse impacts on NPS unit
resources and public health and safety.
The
NPS declared that the promulgation of the final rule allowed extending the
scope of application to 60% of the oil and gas operations in NPS units that
were previously exempted under the 1978 regulations.
Written by Chloe Marie
– Research Fellow
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