3,000 acres excluded from Permian Basin lease sale to protect local natural resources
Thousands of acres of public land in southeast New Mexico were dropped from an oil and gas lease auction scheduled in June after the lands were found to be in sensitive geological areas near two national parks. A federal agency found extraction in those areas could lead to contamination of the region’s water table and collapse cave systems nearby.
The Bureau of Land Management recently published a final notice for its second quarter lease sale planned for June 20, removing seven parcels in the Carlsbad area and cutting the sale by 3,152 acres.
As it stands, the sale offered four parcels in Eddy County on 760 acres, five parcels in Lea County on 480 acres and two parcels in Chaves County on 359 acres, for a total of about 1,600 acres in New Mexico.
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The parcels were deferred after the BLM found they were in areas known for karstic landforms. Karst is a landscape formed by dissolved bedrock, mostly limestone and gypsum and other soluble rocks. That rock is eaten away by slightly acidic water, fueled by carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere and in the soil when rain falls to the ground, creating a weak carbonic acid.
Karstic formations like aquifers and caves are porous, filtering and containing underground water supplies. If entered by water, contaminants could leach into the local water table and impact drinking water quality throughout the region. Surface disturbance could cause the landforms to collapse, impeding their ability to filter ground water needed by local communities.
Karst was a key reason the lands were deferred, according to BLM records. The remaining lands were offered on the condition that no surface disturbance occur within 200 meters of known cave entrances or significant karst features. Operators can seek permanent waivers or one-time exemptions to this and other environmental conditions, according to the BLM.
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Oil drilling can damage cave systems
An environmental impact statement showed eight nominated parcels would intersect about 1,163 acres of low-cave-potential areas, and two parcels would intersect about 240 acres of high-cave potential areas. Two parcels in Chaves County did not have available cave potential data, read the report.
“Losses of circulation during drilling and cementing introduce foreign materials into the subterranean environment, while the opening of subterranean voids could change airflow patterns within a cave system to negatively impact the cave ecosystem and compromise the structural integrity of the cave passage,” the report read.
“While several measures can be implemented to mitigate impacts, it is still possible for impacts to occur from containment failures, well blowouts, accidents, spills and structural collapses.”
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The report also noted two of the nominated parcels were with an area of critical environmental concern (ACEC) in the Chosa Draw area near Guadalupe Mountains National Park. The Chosa Draw cave system contains “several hundred” gypsum caves and possesses the densest karts terrain by area in the U.S., the report read.
Several public comments submitted to the BLM ahead of the lease sale pointed to the impacts on Chosa Draw and other karstic landforms in the nominated lands, arguing oil and gas development would prove too risky.
The BLM ultimately agreed.
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“Based on the analysis and IM 2023-007 Evaluating Competitive Oil and Gas Lease Sale Parcels for Future Lease Sales, the BLM has decided to remove seven parcels from consideration,” read a BLM statement.
Emily Wolf with the National Parks Conservation Association said the deferral was a step toward better conservation of sensitive natural resources amid growing oil and gas operations in the Permian Basin. The basin, traversing southeast New Mexico and West Texas, is the highest oil-producing region in the U.S., generating about 6 million barrels per day.
In New Mexico, the U.S.’s second-highest oil producer after Texas, about half of the state’s oil is generated on federal land mostly in the Permian. Wolf contended 98 percent of the BLM-managed lands in its Carlsbad planning area in the southeast corner of the state was already offered or leased to oil companies by the agency.
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She said the agency should increase its efforts to map resources like karst to avoid fossil fuel development from intruding. Oil and gas development risks impacts to air quality, soil, wildlife and public health, Wolfe said, along with cave-ins and sinkholes in karstic areas.
“Our concerns are really rooted in the fact that rampant energy development in the area poses a risk to these sensitive areas in this region,” she said. “There is very little vulnerability mapping that has been done. We’d really like to see a pause on this very quick and widespread energy development to make sure these resources are protected.”
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Some of the deferred parcels were also “very close” to Carlsbad Caverns National Park, Wolfe said. That park along with Guadalupe Mountains and White Sands National Park in southwest New Mexico were listed by the Association as two of the top 10 most polluted in the National Park Service in a recent report, mostly due to nearby industrial development.
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Carlsbad Caverns was ranked fifth, while Guadalupe Mountains was eighth and White Sands was 10th, according to the report, which considered factors like air pollution, haze, damage to nature and climate change impacts.
Wolfe said the BLM must balance conservation and recreational uses of public lands with energy development, advocating for a recent rulemaking proposed by the agency to allow for leasing of lands for conservation alongside oil and gas.
“These commonsense reforms give the agency more ability to put conservation on a level playing field with development,” she said. “In this area around Carlsbad Caverns, since there already have been impacts and there are so many unknowns, we really just want to see a more thorough mapping of where these resources area so the BLM can avoid them.
“There are so many incredible resources and entities that want to defend them and protect them from oil and gas development.”
Adrian Hedden can be reached at 575-628-5516, achedden@currentargus.com or @AdrianHedden on the social media platform X.
This article originally appeared on Carlsbad Current-Argus: Permian Basin lease sale excludes 3,000 acres to protect karst
