September 26, 2024 |
Photo – Your Public Lands – a sign by BLM – Courtesy National Audubon Society web page
Wyoming state agencies are squaring off against the Bureau of Land Management over the BLM’s Rock Springs Resource Land Management Planning process. The federal plan to restrict use on large swaths of federal land does not sit well in Cheyenne.
Governor Mark Gordon announced Wednesday that various state departments, including the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Wyoming Game and Fish, Wyoming Department of Agriculture, Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, and Wyoming State Parks submitted protest packages to the BLM.
In a statement Wednesday, the governor indicated that the letters of protests represent an effort to correct a planning effort that has gone off-track, and no longer represents due process or legitimate public concerns.
The Department of Environmental Quality, for instance, notes that the BLM failed to recognize in its order that the DEQ has primacy of over environmental regulation in Wyoming. DEQ notes that under law, the BLM must defer to the state agency.
The state DEQ also notes that unnecessary conflict will result if the federal agency “attempts to exercise authority it does not have” regarding the regulation of air, land carbon sequestration and industrial siting.
Quoting from the agency’s official protest, the final environmental impact statement from the BLM “acknowledges WDEQ primacy with regards to water quality in Section 4.5.1, however the federal agency asserts that it can determine whether a surface water discharge should be authorized. Only the state DEQ has this authority”, the complaint Wyoming asserts.
The state agency also states that the BLM failed to recognize the WDEQ’s primacy on air quality matters derived from the federal Clean Air Act.
The state department of Environmental Quality also questions the basic math in the final EIS, noting that different quantifying numbers are used from the draft EIS to the final document without note or explanation.
The state alleges a lack of scientific grounding of the federal bureaucrats, noting that the federal response “proves how utterly deficient BLM’s understanding of Wyoming’s emissions inventory tracking is.”
The Wyoming DEQ also notes that the Biden Administration failed to address numerous technical questions in the final draft. Todd Parfitt, the DEQ director concludes that the BLM’s decision runs contrary to the cooperative intent of NEPA and ignores DEQ’s primacy in the matter.
In a separate letter, the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission protests the BLM’s final decision, noting that the federal lands agency ignored or failed to adequately address made by organization. Tom Kropatsch, also notes that the BLM did not adhere to applicable regulations.
The WOGCC’s blistering comments note that “BLM couldn’t be bothered to make any attempt at incorporating the new royalty rate into the analysis and continues to use the legacy rate of 12.5%.”
The response from the Oil and Gas Commission forcefully attacks the lack of intelligence on the part of federal bureaucrats working for the Biden Administration. Kropatsch said the BLM ignored industry comments or provided flawed and deficient analysis.
The Wyoming oil and gas commission concludes its response by asking that the BLM rescind the final EIS and prepare a new analysis that complies with existing regulations.
Doug Miyamoto, the Director of the Department of Agriculture, notes that the proposed RMP is “exceptionally misaligned” in several areas, and offered suggestions to address the agency’s protest points.
In addition to the comments from state agency heads, the 210-page state response is crammed with technical scientific information. The data released Wednesday by governor represents a broad analytical critique by Wyoming officials of the Biden Administration’s radical plan to prohibit a wide spectrum of human activity on federal lands in Sweetwater County. Wind and solar energy development will be allowed, the BLM has reported.
The Wyoming Game and Fish Department also protested the plan by the Biden-Harris administration to micromanage the wild Wyoming landscape through the final EIS, noting that the “BLM’s goals improperly pursue wildlife objectives over which they have no authority.”
The comments and supporting evidence from state agencies now go to the BLM director, who is required to respond to each protest. A Protest Resolution Report will be published by the BLM in the future.
Members of the public who commented on the draft RMP have 30 days to file a protest with the federal agency. The Governor’s Consistency Review on the document, which Governor Gordon will submit in late October, prior to the presidential election in November.
