McAuliffe says new offshore oil and gas leasing program bad for Virginia

RICHMOND — Gov. Terry McAuliffe, at various points in his political career an opponent and proponent of oil-and-gas drilling off Virginia’s coast, told the federal government Thursday that he opposes including Virginia waters in the new leasing program being assembled by the Trump administration.

“A primary concern that must be satisfied in order for Virginia to be included in the leasing area is a revenue-sharing agreement between participating Atlantic Coast states and the federal government,” McAuliffe wrote to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. “Today we are no closer to resolving this issue than when I became governor.”

The bureau is in the middle of drawing up a new oil-and-gas leasing program for 2019-2024, a plan that could include the Atlantic.

Though former President Barack Obama’s Interior Department ultimately opted to exclude the Atlantic from its program, Trump’s administration reversed course, rescinding an order prohibiting seismic surveying in the Atlantic and opening up a public comment period for the new program.

Read more: http://www.roanoke.com/news/virginia/mcauliffe-says-new-offshore-oil-and-gas-leasing-program-bad/article_72af09a3-1d65-5df2-a27a-ada640fd9e95.html