U.S. to hold Gulf of Mexico oil and gas auction next month

The Biden administration finalized a plan to offer drilling rights on more than 70 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas companies next month, it said on Friday.
The auction, the U.S. government’s first in the oil-rich region since 2021, fulfills a provision in President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which requires the government to lease federal lands for oil and gas development.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) said it will offer 73.3 million acres in the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) in the Gulf. Bids are due March 28 and will be read at a live-streamed event on BOEM’s website on March 29.
The auction will test industry demand for investment in the Gulf after the Russian invasion of Ukraine a year ago ratcheted up pressure on the administration to increase domestic supplies of oil and gas.
In a statement, oil and gas trade group the National Ocean Industries Association said the sale was “vital to our national security interests and will contribute important energy supplies amid tight global demand.”