Oil companies shun Trump administration’s Alaska offshore auction
Oil and gas drillers failed to show up at the Trump administration’s sale of more than 400,000 hectares in Alaska’s Cook Inlet on Wednesday, declining to submit even a single bid.
The sale was the first of six Alaska offshore oil and gas auctions mandated through 2032 by U.S. President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), which he signed into law last year.
Trump has sought to expand domestic oil and gas resources, including in Alaska where production has been in decline for decades. Drilling in the Arctic and Alaska is a high-risk endeavor, involving decades of work and billions of dollars of investment.
Officials from the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) had planned to read bids via a livestream on the agency’s website Wednesday morning. Bids were due a day earlier, on March 3.
Instead, BOEM’s sale website was updated to reflect the lack of bids.
“At this time, no bids have been received,” BOEM wrote. “In accordance with OBBBA, we will continue to hold leasing opportunities for Cook Inlet so that industry has a regular, predictable federal leasing schedule that ensures we achieve President Trump’s American Energy Dominance Agenda.”
Cook Inlet stretches about 290 kilometres from the Gulf of Alaska to Anchorage, separating the Kenai Peninsula from the mainland.
The last federal auction for acreage in Cook Inlet, held in 2022, attracted just one bid.
There are eight active federal leases in Cook Inlet, all owned by Houston-based Hilcorp. They are not currently producing oil or gas.
Related stories from around the North:
Canada: PM, Manitoba reaffirm Arctic Gateway push, though project absent from recent federal priority list, CBC News
Greenland: Greenland’s leader hails EU as trusted friend and urges investment in its minerals, The Associated Press
Norway: Lawmakers in Norway make a deal opening up for deep sea mining in Arctic Ocean, The Associated Press
Russia: Putin in Arkhangelsk: Arctic industry and infrastructure on agenda, The Independent Barents Observer
Sweden: Just how significant is the discovery of rare earth metals in Arctic Sweden?
United States: Alaskan tribes sue B.C. gov’t over mines in far northwest, CBC News
