• About-Face Tweet on Florida Drilling May Backfire on U.S. Agency - Bloomberg
    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-10/about-face-tweet-on-florida-drilling-may-backfire-on-u-s-agency

    Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke just handed offshore drilling foes ammunition for lawsuits by declaring the Florida coast off limits.

    Zinke declared he would dial back a proposal to auction drilling rights in as much as 90 percent of U.S. coastal waters less than a week after the plan was unveiled. The decision, announced Tuesday in a tweet, appeared to circumvent a detailed process laid out in federal law and came without any detailed explanation to justify the changes.

    It’s politically unwise and legally unwise,” said Michael Livermore, an administrative law professor at the University of Virginia. "They have a draft out there, and there is a formal process for making changes to the draft. And they’re circumventing that."

    Zinke’s declaration followed a meeting with one of the plan’s top Republican opponents, Florida Governor Rick Scott.
    […]
    At least 11 governors have asked the Interior Department to leave their states out of any new leasing plan. Some of them responded to Zinke’s pronouncement by demanding meetings with the Interior secretary to argue against new offshore drilling near their shores.

    New York doesn’t want drilling off our coast either,” the state’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, said on Twitter. “Where do we sign up for a waiver?

    Representative Ted Lieu, a Democrat from California, said Zinke did “not justify discriminatory agency action in favor of Florida over other states” and offered “no evidence other governors can’t be trusted.

    Il y a 23 états côtiers aux É.-U. (dont 4 (hors Floride) sur le Golfe du Mexique pour lequel l’appel d’offres pour les permis d’exploration à déjà été publié.

    • Waters Near Florida Still Being Considered for Oil Drilling - Bloomberg
      https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-19/waters-near-florida-still-being-considered-for-oil-drilling

      Despite Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke’s Jan. 9 declaration that Florida is “off the table” for offshore oil drilling, that activity is actually still on the table.

      The acting director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management made clear Friday that Zinke’s decision, announced on Twitter and described to reporters in the Tallahassee airport, doesn’t stop a formal process of considering whether to sell drilling rights in waters near the Florida coast.

      It is not a formal action,” Walter Cruickshank told a House subcommittee. That means waters around Florida, including the south Atlantic and eastern Gulf of Mexico, remain under consideration. “They are still part of the analysis until the secretary gives us an official decision otherwise.

      Une chose est sure, la bataille de lobbies bat son plein.

      Et cette déclaration ressemble bien à une tentative de désamorçage des recours auxquels la déclaration de R. Zinke a ouvert un boulevard.