Seven Days After an Industry Petition, Interior Opens NEPA Scoping for an NPR-A "Development Permit Program"
A Federal Register notice published May 19 confirms the Bureau of Land Management is initiating an Environmental Impact Statement to support a rulemaking that would pre-authorize "qualifying production sites" across the 23-million-acre National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska — moving from project-by-project NEPA review to a criteria-based permit-by-rule framework. BLM cites a petition filed by the Alaska Oil and Gas Association exactly one week earlier as the trigger.
The Bureau of Land Management published a Notice of Intent in Tuesday's Federal Register to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement examining a rulemaking that would replace the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska's project-by-project NEPA process with a "criteria-based framework" for streamlined permitting. The notice — citation 91 FR 29155 — opens a 45-day public scoping period that closes July 6, 2026.
The trigger, named explicitly in the notice, is a petition the Alaska Oil and Gas Association (AOGA) submitted to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum on May 12, 2026 — seven days before publication. BLM writes that it "is giving this Petition prompt consideration" and "expects to initiate a rulemaking proposing a rule that may reflect the Requested Rule in the Petition, in whole or in part."
What the rulemaking would change
NPR-A — 23 million acres on Alaska's North Slope — is governed by the Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act of 1976, which directs the Secretary to conduct "an expeditious program of competitive leasing." Under current practice, each new production site has gone through its own NEPA analysis: Alpine Satellite Development (2004), Greater Mooses Tooth 1 (2014), Greater Mooses Tooth 2 (2018), the area-wide Integrated Activity Plan (2020), and the Willow Master Development Plan (2023) all required individual EISs.
The petition asks BLM to amend 43 CFR part 3160 to create what AOGA calls a "Development Permit Program": a single regulation that would pre-authorize a defined category of "qualifying production sites and associated rights-of-way" — gravel pads, gravel access roads, pipelines, and supporting facilities — when an applicant demonstrates the project meets predetermined criteria. BLM frames the current case-by-case approach as "not just inefficient" but a failure to provide industry with "a stable and predictable regulatory framework."
The notice describes the legal mechanism in NEPA-handbook terms — "general permitting and permit by rule" — and ties the proposed action to two of President Trump's first-day executive orders:
- Executive Order 14154, "Unleashing American Energy" (January 20, 2025), which directs agencies to "undertake all available efforts to eliminate delays within their respective permitting processes, including through, but not limited to, the use of general permitting and permit by rule."
- Executive Order 14153, "Unleashing Alaska's Extraordinary Resource Potential" (January 20, 2025), which makes it U.S. policy to "expedite the permitting and leasing of energy and natural resources projects in Alaska."
The EIS will examine impacts on subsistence resources, caribou, polar bear, migratory birds, fish, surface water, wetlands, permafrost, air quality, noise, cultural and historic resources, visual resources, and socioeconomic conditions.
The 2026 timeline so far
The notice slots into a year of accelerating BLM actions in NPR-A:
| Date | Action |
|---|---|
| Jan. 20, 2025 | EO 14153 directs reopening of NPR-A and Secretary's Order 3422 |
| Nov. 17, 2025 | Interior rescinds the May 2024 NPR-A management rule that had expanded "Special Area" protections |
| March 2026 | NPR-A lease sale: $163.7 million in receipts on 187 tracts, characterized by Interior as the most revenue ever from a reserve sale |
| May 12, 2026 | AOGA submits Petition for Rulemaking to create a Development Permit Program |
| May 15, 2026 | Interior press release announcing the streamlining initiative; Burgum: "Industry has shown for years that energy development in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska can be done responsibly" |
| May 19, 2026 | BLM publishes Notice of Intent; 45-day public scoping period opens |
| July 6, 2026 | Scoping period closes |
| Late 2026 / early 2027 | Final EIS and Record of Decision expected, alongside the final rule |
Per Interior's May 15 release, approximately 1.6 million acres of NPR-A are currently under lease, with roughly 82% of the reserve reopened to leasing under the updated Integrated Activity Plan.
What is — and is not — being decided
The Notice of Intent is not the rule. It is the procedural start of the analysis that will accompany the rule. BLM has not published proposed regulatory text, has not committed to a specific set of "qualifying" criteria, and notes the EIS "may also consider additional alternatives," including varying numbers of production sites, geographic clustering, and "additional monitoring and enforcement provisions."
The petition's Appendix A — described in the notice as "regulatory modifications provided at Appendix A (the 'Requested Rule')" — is the closest publicly available draft of what the program could look like. It is posted to BLM's ePlanning site under NEPA number DOI-BLM-AK-0000-2026-0012-EIS.
Comments may be submitted via eplanning.blm.gov (project DOI-BLM-AK-0000-2026-0012-EIS) or by mail to the BLM Alaska State Office, 222 West 7th Avenue, #13, Anchorage, AK 99513-7599. Tribal consultation under Executive Order 13175 and Section 810 of ANILCA will run in parallel.