Interior fast-tracking drilling permit process

The Interior Department, intent on boosting oil and gas production on federal lands, issued an order on Thursday designed to speed up the permitting process for drilling.

Coming on the heels of the Trump administration's self-styled Energy Week in late June, Secretary Ryan Zinke's order is its latest effort to loosen restrictions on the fossil fuel industry. The White House is pushing for more domestic oil, natural gas and coal production so that the United States can become a net energy exporter as part of President Trump's "energy dominance" agenda.

The Interior Department said the average approval time for a drilling permit during the last fiscal year under the Obama administration was 257 days, though the most recent statistics suggest it was 220 days. The result of that approval pace, according to the agency, was that the Bureau of Land Management ( BLM) had 2,802 drilling permit applications pending when Trump took office.

Zinke said the aim of his order is to untangle the bureaucratic knot so the BLM can review permit applications within 30 days, as mandated by statute. He also ordered oil and gas lease sales be held in each state every quarter.

"The Department of the Interior will be a better neighbor," Zinke said in a statement.

Environmental groups criticized the move as yet another unnecessary handout to oil and gas companies, which have considerable access to federal lands.

"Fast- tracking oil and gas exploitation on our public lands is wrong for America," Sharon Buccino, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's land and wildlife program, said in a statement.