Senate bills would give more coastal states offshore revenue shares

US senators introduced a trio of bills on May 11 to establish or increase shares of federal revenue with states that have federal oil and gas leases off their coasts. Measures sponsored by Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chair Lisa Murkowski (R-Alas.), Bill Cassidy (R-La.), and Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) will be discussed with 23 others dealing with energy supplies during a May 19 committee hearing.

The bills would establish offshore revenue sharing in areas adjacent to their sponsors’ states. Warner’s bill, S. 1279, differs from the other two because it’s bipartisan. Cosponsors are Virginia’s other US Senator, Timothy M. Kaine (D), as well as Republicans from North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

Murkowski’s bill, S. 1278, includes a provision that directs 2.5% of qualified revenue for Alaska’s higher education institutions and workforce investment boards to provide training programs for pipeline and environmental management employees. Another 2.5% would be designated to financially assist the state’s offshore oil and gas leasing programs, and to develop pipeline rights-of-way for new offshore production.

Raise Gulf Coast caps

Cassidy’s bill, S. 1276, was cosponsored by other Republicans from Mississippi, Texas, and Louisiana. It would increase the revenue sharing cap established under the 2006 Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act for Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, and Alabama, from $500 million/year in 2017 to close to $700 million/year in 2018-25, and $1 billion/year in 2026-55.

The cap also would be lifted to allow for greater allocations to the Land and Water Conservation Fund state grant program, which shares 12.5% in the four states’ offshore revenue.

The bill also would provide Florida a 37.5% share of federal offshore oil and gas revenue from the eastern Gulf of Mexico, where the measure would authorize leasing, starting in fiscal 2017. Florida would receive an estimated $1.6 billion over 10 years as its eastern gulf revenue share, Cassidy said.

Neither of Florida’s two US senators has expressed enthusiasm for the measure. Democrat Bill Nelson, in fact, introduced a bill on Apr. 30 that would prohibit offshore seismic activity off the state’s Atlantic, as well as gulf, coasts (OGJ Online, May 4, 2015). Some US House members from Florida’s congressional delegation introduced similar legislation subsequently.

Contact Nick Snow at [email protected].