Trump moves to open more public land to drilling in California

An oil field is seen on Wednesday, March 15, 2017, in Bakersfield, Calif. An oil field is seen on Wednesday, March 15, 2017, in Bakersfield, Calif. Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle Image 1 of / 42 Caption Close Trump moves to open more public land to drilling in California 1 / 42 Back to Gallery

The Trump administration forged ahead with its commitment to boosting domestic fossil fuel production Thursday, directing more public lands to be opened for oil and gas extraction — a move that could bring new drill rigs to California.

The state hasn’t seen new onshore oil and gas leases offered up on federal land in four years because of environmental fights. The order signed by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on Thursday has some environmentalists fearing that de facto moratorium will soon end.

At minimum, the administration’s action will intensify the push by energy companies to broaden drilling across California’s prime oil country, in the interior Central Coast region and the southern San Joaquin Valley, and promises a new round of drawn-out conservation battles.

Zinke’s order calls for federal oil and gas leases to be auctioned off at least four times a year in every state where reserves are available. That charge does away with what the oil industry says are sometimes concerted efforts to delay or thwart lease sales and hamper energy exploration.

The order also seeks to reduce the nation’s backlog of drilling applications through speedier approval of oil- and gas-extraction permits.

The administration’s action applies to 700 million acres of underground mineral reserves managed by the Bureau of Land Management, mostly in the West. It does not apply to national parks or national forests.

California ranks as the nation’s third-biggest producer of onshore oil and the 13th-biggest for natural gas. About 12 million barrels of oil and 9 billion cubic feet of natural gas were produced through some 500 leases on public lands in the state in 2016, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

Still, the oil industry has long complained that too much acreage is off-limits — 10 percent of the state’s production is on federal land — and that environmental regulations governing drilling are unnecessarily cumbersome.

“This executive order is a positive first step, but production on federal lands is a complicated process with oversight roles by a number of state and federal regulatory agencies,” said Rock Zierman, chief executive officer of the California Independent Petroleum Association.

The American Petroleum Institute said the administration’s action would benefit the industry nationally, allowing it to invest in projects that would create jobs and benefit consumers through lower energy prices.

Environmentalists, who had far greater access to the Obama administration than they do to President Trump, predicted a gloomy future for federally owned open space.

“We’re coming off a Fourth of July weekend when a number of Americans are out enjoying their public lands, and here’s Zinke and Trump threatening to turn them into oil and gas fields,” said Hollin Kretzmann, staff attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, a group that has opposed drilling in California. “This new directive could have far-reaching consequences. Even where you see no wells today, there’s potential for oil and gas activities to expand.”

Speaking at a news conference in Washington, Zinke said the order was part of Trump’s broader “America first” energy policy, which has included several attempts to expand oil and gas development both onshore and off. In April, the administration issued a directive for the Interior Department to consider expanding ocean drilling, a review that is ongoing.

“We’re going to be a fair and prudent partner, but we’re not going to be an adversary to creating wealth and opportunity on some of our public lands,” Zinke said.

Zinke criticized the Obama administration for putting off lease sales, saying the federal Mineral Leasing Act requires quarterly auctions. He also said oil and gas companies have been forced to wait an average 257 days for reviews of drilling applications on federally leased land even though the law limits the approval process to 30 days.

As of Jan. 31, the Bureau of Land Management had 2,802 unprocessed applications for mineral development, according to the Interior Department.

In California, the prime area for exploration is in Kern County, where most the of the state’s extraction is done now. The Bureau of Land Management also controls land in Tulare, Fresno, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Ventura and Monterey counties, where drilling could also expand.

Some areas have local protections in place, which would complicate any efforts to issue new oil and gas leases. In Monterey County, for example, residents voted last year to ban fracking and new oil development, though courts have put the prohibition on hold while a legal challenge is heard.

In any case, the order’s effects will probably not be felt for at least a year in California. A pair of lawsuits over the Bureau of Land Management’s lease sales are forcing the agency to redo the way in which it auctions drilling rights. In the meantime, no new leases can be offered.

The agency has not said when it expects to complete its new leasing plan, but plaintiffs in the case say it probably won’t be until well into 2018. Even then, the plaintiffs are prepared to go back to court if they need to make sure the plan is ecologically sound.

Their fear is that drilling will not only destroy the public’s enjoyment of federal lands and potentially litter the areas with industrial waste, but hasten climate change by increasing fossil fuel use.

“The BLM and Interior Department under Trump are so ideological with their head in the sand that their environment analysis will probably be woefully insufficient,” said Brendan Cummings, conservation director for Center for Biological Diversity, which brought the successful suits. “And the very desire of them to go full bore with leasing regardless of the consequences makes any new leases legally more vulnerable.”

Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander