Abigail Ross Hopper News

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper announced the bureau will offer more than 48 million acres offshore Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama for oil and gas exploration and development, in a lease sale that will include all available unleased areas in the Central Planning Area (CPA). “As one of the most productive basins in the world, the Gulf of Mexico remains an important component of our domestic energy strategy to create jobs, foster economic opportunities, and reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil,” Hopper said. BOEM will livestream Central Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 247 on March 22, 2017. Livestreaming the sale enables BOEM to deliver pertinent bid information immediately to a much broader national and international audience.

Today’s U.S. oil and gas Lease Sale 248 garnered $18,067,020 in high bids for 24 tracts covering 138,240 acres in the Western Gulf of Mexico Planning Area, announced Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper. A total of three offshore energy companies participated in 24 bids. The sum of all bids received totaled $18,067,020. In this sale, part of the Obama Administration's continued commitment to safe and responsible domestic energy production, BOEM offered 23.8 million acres in federal waters offshore Texas for oil and gas exploration and development. “The Gulf of Mexico continues to be one of the most productive basins in the world and is an important part of our Nation’s domestic energy portfolio,” Hopper said.

A new lease sale has been proposed for 122,405 acres for commercial wind energy leasing offshore North Carolina. The proposed lease, announced today by U.S. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper as part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan, is for the Kitty Hawk Wind Energy Area, which BOEM identified in consultation with its North Carolina Intergovernmental Renewable Energy Task Force and outreach with stakeholders. “This is an important and exciting milestone in our ongoing efforts to tap the vast wind energy resources along the Atlantic Coast,” said Secretary Jewell.

Denmark and the United States have signed a memorandum to strengthen cooperation on offshore wind energy projects, the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) announced. On May 4, 2016 at the Embassy of Denmark in Washington, D.C., Danish Ambassador Lars Gert Lose and BOEM Director Abigail Ross Hopper signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to recognize their countries' common interests in developing offshore wind as a clean and sustainable energy source. “This is a historic event for our respective countries as we work together to share knowledge…

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has signed an agreement with the City of Jacksonville, Fla., and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers authorizing them to dredge nearly 1.4 million cubic yards of sand from federal waters for periodic renourishment of the Duval County shoreline. The shore protection project, using sand from the seafloor of the federal Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), will restore a 10-mile stretch of coast between the St. Johns River entrance and the Duval County/St. Johns County boundary along the Atlantic Ocean. Dredging is expected to begin in the summer of 2016. “BOEM is pleased to support the City of Jacksonville with this restoration project,” said BOEM Director Abigail Ross Hopper.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) announced its approval of the first wind energy Research Activities Plan (RAP) for a facility to be located in U.S. federal waters, as part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to create American jobs, develop clean energy sources and cut carbon pollution. Last year, BOEM awarded a research lease to the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy (DMME) on the Outer Continental Shelf off the coast of Virginia. Today’s action clears the way for the installation and operation of two 6-megawatt (MW) turbines and associated cabling to shore, pending final engineering review of the project. The electricity generated by these turbines could power 3,000 homes.

Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper today announced Mike Celata as the Regional Director of the Gulf of Mexico Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Region. Celata, who starts his position immediately, has been with BOEM and its predecessors since 1988. He has been acting Regional Director since March. The Gulf of Mexico Region is responsible for managing more than 4,600 active leases over 25 million acres of land on the OCS. “Mike has many years of service with the agency, working on aspects of the OCS energy program and on regional and national ocean policy initiatives,” said BOEM Director Abigail Ross Hopper. After receiving a B.A.

As part of President Obama’s comprehensive Climate Action Plan to create American jobs, develop domestic clean energy resources and cut carbon pollution, the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) yesterday held the nation’s fifth competitive lease sale for renewable energy in federal waters, which offered nearly 344,000 acres offshore New Jersey for potential wind energy development. The provisional winners of today’s lease sale are RES America Developments Inc., which bid $880,715 for lease area OCS-A 0498 (160,480 acres), and US Wind Inc., which bid $1,006,240 for OCS-A 0499 (183,353 acres). Fishermen’s Energy LLC also participated in the lease sale. According to an analysis prepared by the U.S.

As part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to develop domestic clean energy resources, cut carbon pollution and create American jobs, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper announced that 343,833 acres offshore New Jersey will be offered for commercial wind energy development in a competitive lease sale on November 9, 2015. If fully developed, the New Jersey Wind Energy Area could support at least 3,400 megawatts of commercial wind generation, enough to power an estimated 1.2 million homes, according to the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

As part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to create American jobs, develop domestic clean energy sources and cut carbon pollution, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) today announced it completed an important environmental review, allowing BOEM to move forward with its process for considering a renewable energy lease sale offshore North Carolina. BOEM’s revised environmental assessment (EA), which was conducted according to National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requirements, found there would be no significant environmental or socioeconomic impacts from issuing wind energy leases within three Wind Energy Areas (WEAs) offshore North Carolina.

Despite the continued depressed price of oil and gas, the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) via Director Abigail Ross Hopper announced that BOEM will offer 40 million acres offshore Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama for oil and gas exploration and development in sales that will include all available unleased areas in the Central and Eastern Gulf of Mexico Planning Areas. Proposed Gulf of Mexico Central Planning Area Lease Sale 241 and Eastern Planning Area Lease Sale 226, scheduled to take place in New Orleans, Louisiana, in March of 2016, will be the ninth and tenth offshore sales under the Administration’s Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2012-2017 (Five-Year Program).

A U.S. government sale of oil and gas drilling leases in the western Gulf of Mexico attracted the lowest number of bids on record on Wednesday as slumping oil prices kept producers from plowing money into expensive offshore prospects. The yearly sale, held by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), attracted $22.7 million in high bids, the smallest in the western Gulf since 1983 when leases were first broken down into regions, the BOEM said, reaping just one fifth of the value of last year's offers. "The continuing drop in oil prices and low natural gas prices obviously affect industry's short-term investment decisions," BOEM Director Abigail Ross Hopper said in a statement, also stressing the long term potential of Gulf of Mexico oil and gas production. U.S.

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has executed a wind energy research lease with the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy (DMME), BOEM announced today. This is BOEM’s first executed wind energy research lease, coming as part of the Obama Administration’s Climate Action Plan to create American jobs, develop domestic clean energy resources and cut carbon pollution. Under this lease, DMME proposes to design, develop and demonstrate a grid-connected, 12-megawatt (MW) offshore wind test facility on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) off the coast of Virginia – adjacent to the Virginia Wind Energy Area (WEA).

The U.S. Department of the Interior sold leases on oil and gas properties in the Gulf of Mexico today, receiving $538.7 million in high bids. The U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Ocean Management (BOEM) took bids for 169 tracts on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf off Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, the Bureau announced in a press release. 42 offshore energy companies submitted a total of 195 bids totaling $583 million, meaning most of the tracts had just one bidder.

U.S. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell will travel to New Orleans on Wednesday, March 18, 2015 to attend and open bids at an oil and gas lease sale offering 41.2 million acres for exploration and development in the Central Planning Area offshore Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. The results of the sale will be announced later in the morning during a media teleconference with Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper and Regional Director John Rodi.

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) and Naval Air Station Oceana at Dam Neck, Virginia, expect to begin a shore protection project at the Dam Neck annex within the next month. Sand from the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), to be used for this project, will enhance coastal resilience by protecting shoreline infrastructure. In addition, the project will restore shorebird and sea turtle nesting habitat and improve the recreational beach in this Virginia Beach community.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Director Abigail Ross Hopper announced James (Jim) F. Bennett as BOEM’s new Chief for the Office of Renewable Energy Programs (OREP), the program responsible for overseeing offshore renewable energy development on the Outer Continental Shelf. Bennett has 35 years of Federal service and has served in a variety of capacities around the Department of the Interior and the Bureau. Most recently, he served as the Chief of the Division of…

The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) released a Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (FSEIS) for Chukchi Sea Lease Sale 193, moving the DOI a step closer to resolving federal court concerns regarding the 2008 oil and gas leases offshore Alaska. The FSEIS updates the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s (BOEM) estimates of the full range of production levels from offshore oil fields that might be developed in the Chukchi Sea as well as the related potential environmental effects of the lease sale. “Alaska is a critical component of our nation’s energy portfolio, and the Chukchi Sea has substantial oil and gas potential, as well as sensitive marine and coastal resources that Alaska Native communities depend on for subsistence,” said Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell.

Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell today named Abigail Ross Hopper as the Director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), which manages the development of our nation’s conventional and renewable energy and marine mineral resources on the Outer Continental Shelf. Hopper currently serves as the Director of the Maryland Energy Administration and will assume her new position on January 5, 2015, as the second director in BOEM's history. Hopper will take the helm from Acting Director Dr. Walter Cruickshank, who has been serving since former Director Tommy Beaudreau became Chief of Staff to Secretary Jewell in May 2014. “Abigail Hopper’s knowledge of the energy sector…