National Oil and Gas Program and NEPA Jill Lewandowski, Ph.D. Office of Environmental Programs November 13, 2018

National Program Development Process Draft Proposed Program and NOI published on January 8, 2018 47 sales in 25 Planning Areas, as well as direction to analyze “subarea options” Next step is publication of the Proposed Program and Draft Programmatic EIS- date TBD Documents will analyze DPP and subareas EIS will also analyze additional potential exclusion areas nominated by the public, BOEM SMEs, Federal agencies, state and local governments, and tribes and tribal organizations Then Proposed Final Program and Final EIS- expected @ one year from PP and Draft EIS publication

DPP Decision (47 sales in 25 Planning Areas)

DPP Decision (47 sales in 25 Planning Areas)

DPP Subarea Options (Exclusions)

Draft Programmatic EIS STREAMLINING NEPA Last PEIS was >900 pages with a substantially smaller geographic scope Recent executive and Secretarial directives limit the document to no more than 300 pages Analyzing 25 planning areas in ⅓ of the pages required a strategic, focused approach Due to a new administration and new executive and secretarial orders, we were faced with some new challenges. [bring in corresponding animations to match verbal description] Last time, 5 program areas were considered and this time we have 25. Last time, it took 19 months from when the DPP was published to get to the Draft EIS. This time, it will be 9 months (assuming things publish on time) Last time, we had no page limit. This time, our limit is 300 pages. We also consider some new areas that have not previously been considered/analyzed. So, facing some new challenges we had to do some restructuring. A major concern throughout the process was “how can we save space” due to the strict page limits. This is why this new EIS looks a bit different than any of the previous ones.

Approach to Draft PEIS Ecoregion concept (also compares across regions) Binary significance determinations (potentially significant or not expected to be significant) Focus only on issues that may be potentially significant Incorporated other analyses by reference Focus on visuals Cumulative effects Exclusions analysis

BOEM Ecoregions Areas with similar biota, geographic conditions, etc. Describe at the broadest level first (region), then ecoregion, then planning area. Specific planning areas are only mentioned when something is unique to that planning area.

Approach to Draft PEIS REGIONAL IMPACTS: Explains the nature of impacts NATIONAL IMPACTS: Marine mammals can be affected by noise because… Explains the context or species that are impacted REGIONAL IMPACTS: Marine mammals in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas Ecoregion, such as bowhead or beluga whales, may be affected by noise in unique ways because… What does this actually look like? Within the “national impacts” section you’ll see statements like “marine mammals can be affected by noise because”… It explains the nature of impacts… the how. Then within the regional sections, you may see something like these two statements here  these statements provide the context of the impacts or lists the species that may be affected.

Focus on Graphics

Exclusions ALASKA Chukchi Sea Subsistence Use Area 15-mile Chukchi Sea Coastal Buffer 25-mile Chukchi Sea Coastal Buffer 50-mile Chukchi Sea Coastal Buffer Hanna Shoal Expanded Hanna Shoal Barrow Whaling Area Expanded Barrow Whaling Area Barrow Canyon Environmentally Important Area (EIA) Harrison Bay EIA Cross Island EIA Camden Bay EIA Kaktovik Whaling Area Kaktovik Bowhead Whaling Area Kaktovik EIA GULF OF MEXICO Topographic Features and Pinnacle Trend Stipulations Baldwin County Buffer 50-, 75-, 100-, and 125-mile Eastern GOM Coastal Buffers  ATLANTIC 25-nm Coastal Buffer Biodiversity Strip Gulf of Maine Georges Bank Atlantic Canyons Exclusion nominations were evaluated and those that met the criteria were analyzed in the Draft Programmatic EIS. This includes all of the “subarea options” included in the DPP decision. Analysis of exclusions includes consideration of: Available information about the ecological or sociocultural value of the area Impacts that could be reduced or avoided if area was excluded

Chukchi Sea Exclusions Best available science used to support exclusions analysis. BOEM scientist Tim White analyzed ASAMM from 2000­-2016­­ to identify areas of persistence through time (“hotspots”) in the Arctic. This maps shows the DPP subarea options as well as a larger area around Hanna Shoal that was analyzed in the Draft Programmatic EIS. These data show that high densities of walrus use a large area in the vicinity of Hanna Shoal consistently year-to-year. Hot spots numbers are percent (%) probabilities. Areas outside the grids cells had < 10 surveys segments each, which was a minimum effort threshold used to calculate persistence for each cell.   *Note that only areas within the grid cells were included in the analysis.