DRAFT

 

          PLANNING CRITERIA

                  for the

     OIL AND GAS ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT AND

   AMENDMENT OF THE BILLINGS AND POWDER RIVER RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PLANS

       MILES CITY, MONTANA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

        Prepared by:

  U.S. Department of the Interior

    Bureau of Land Management

                 and the

State of Montana

       December 13, 2000

         PLANNING CRITERIA FOR THE OIL AND GAS EIS AND AMENDMENT

 

Overview

 

The Amendment is being prepared to analyze and provide planning and resource allocation decisions and guidelines for the oil and gas program in the Billings and Powder River RMP areas. Planning criteria guide the development of an Amendment/EIS by focusing efforts where they are needed, providing direction for development of the plan; and identifying legal, policy, or regulatory constraints that direct or limit BLM=s ability to resolve issues.

 

Goal

 

The goal of the Amendment is for the BLM and the State to prepare a comprehensive amendment and EIS for the Oil and Gas program within an 18-month timeframe.

 

Objectives

 

The major objectives of this RMP/EIS are:

 

1. To incorporate appropriate laws, regulations, land use decisions, and applicable decisions supported by programmatic EIS=, Environmental Assessments, and State Director=s Guidance.

 

Examples of these are:

 

Oil and Gas EIS and Amendment of the Billings, Powder River and South Dakota RMPs and the Programmatic EIS on Oil and Gas Drilling Production in Montana.

 

2. To address several current and anticipated issues that existing decisions do not address.

 

3. To provide adequate guidance to the oil and gas program.

 

4. To organize existing data, inventories, and basic planning information into a useable, easy-to-follow planning document.

 

5. To take into account the views and needs of the public.

 

The Amendment will strive to meet the goal and objectives. It will include alternatives which are reasonable solutions to existing and anticipated resource conflicts. The State=s Record of Decision and the BLM=s Record of Decision will choose one alternative or aspects of several alternatives, to provide the most useful long-term oil and gas guidance.

 

Basic Planning Criteria

 

The basic planning criteria to be used for all planning documents will be taken from Public Law 94-579, Section 202(a) of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act f 1976 (FLPMA) which states:

 

use and observe the principles of multiple use and sustained yield set forth in this and other applicable law;

 

use a systematic interdisciplinary approach to achieve integrated consideration of physical, biological economic and other sciences;

 

rely, to the extent it is available, on the inventory of public lands, their resources and other values;

 

consider present and potential uses of the public lands;

 

consider the relative scarcity of the values involved and the availability of alternative means (including recycling) and sites for realization of those values;

 

weigh long-term benefits to the public against short-term benefits;

 

provide for compliance with applicable pollution control laws, including State and Federal air, water, noise or other pollution standards or implementation plans; and

 

to the extent consistent with the laws governing the administration of the public lands, coordinate the land use inventory, planning and management activities of or for such lands with the land use planning and management programs of other Federal departments and agencies, and the States and local governments within which the lands are located.

 

Planning criteria that apply to this EIS/Amendment are as follows:

 

1. The EIS/Amendment will stand alone, but may tier off or incorporate by reference other documents (i.e. Oil and Gas Amendment of the Billings, Powder River and South Dakota RMPs, WYODAK EIS, Statewide Programmatic EIS).

 

2. The planning area for BLM is the BLM-administered mineral estate in Wheatland, Golden Valley, Musselshell, Sweet Grass, Stillwater, Yellowstone, Carbon, Big Horn, Treasure, Rosebud, Powder River, Carter and portions of Custer counties. The planning area for the State will be statewide. The planning area excludes those lands administered by other agencies/entities (for example, Forest Service, Tribal lands).

 

3. The analysis area is all lands statewide.

 

4. Alternatives will address the identified issues and management concerns. All other guidance will be presented in the Management Common to All Alternatives section of the Amendment/EIS.

 

5. The alternatives chosen will be economically and technically feasible. Those alternatives, or components of those alternatives found not to be economically or technically feasible or viable will be dropped from or modified for consideration in the range of alternatives.

 

6. Any decision or mitigative measure required by the Amendment/EIS will be enforceable and will lend itself to monitoring.

 

7. The Record of Decision for BLM-administered lands will be prepared in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and will contain the final BLM decisions of the Amendment/EIS.

 

8. Data acquisition will consist primarily of extrapolation and compilation of existing data and appropriate literature search.

 

9. Existing geological and fluid minerals data will be used to develop occurrence potentials and foreseeable development scenarios.

 

10. Narration and format will be based on the Oil and Gas EIS and Amendment of the Billings, Powder River and South Dakota RMPs.

 

11. Geographic Information Systems will be used when possible.

 

12. Current management guidance will be expanded to reflect recent resource regulations and guidelines pertaining to oil and gas operations.

 

13. A list of Sensitive Species will be identified and addressed in the document.

 

 

14. To the extent practicable this document will be consistent with adjoining Forest Service lands and leases.

 

15. Decisions will comply with Rangeland Health Standards.

 

Planning Issues

 

The issues identified for the Amendment/EIS include:

 

A. Air

 

Activity analyzed in Wyoming has identified 1 day per year haze occurring to a Class I airshed in Montana, the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation from mainly railroad activity.

 

B. Water

 

The produced water from coal bed methane development may be of lesser quality than that used for drinking, irrigating, and other beneficial uses in the area.

 

C. Wildlife Habitat

 

Affected vegetation and activity from developing an infrastructure in the Montana portion of the Powder River Basin could affect wildlife habitat availability, escape habitat, and management plans of the Fish, Wildlife and Parks.

 

D. SocioEconomics

 

Two Native American tribes are located within the area - the Crow and Northern Cheyenne Indian reservations. Although excluded from the planning area, the reservations= resources and people could be affected by the plan. Close coordination will take place to see that the Tribe=s needs are considered, analyzed, and that BLM fulfills its trust responsibilities.

 

Oil and gas development could economically affect local communities.

 

Landowners and residents in development areas could be affected by groundwater drawdown. Coal bed methane production could affect springs, livestock watering and domestic water.

 

E. Soils

 

If discharge occurs on the surface, there is potential for erosion of soils.

 

F. Minerals

 

Coal Mines continue to expand over the same area needed for methane development. If the hydrologic balance is not reestablished after development, it may affect the mines= ability to recover their bonds.

G. Vegetation

 

The sodium adsorption ratio indicates that under certain soil conditions, water discharged onto the surface could eventually kill vegetation species that are not salt-tolerant.

 

If large volumes of water are discharged it will cause soils to erode.

 

H. Recreation

 

The infrastructure to accommodate large-scale coal bed methane development could affect hiking, hunting, and other recreational activities.

 

Management Common to all Alternatives

 

Management decisions and guidance common to all alternatives are also provided in the RMP/EIS. They are from existing RMPs, activity plans, laws, regulations, and policies by which the BLM and state are directed. Management Common to all Alternatives is management where no conflict or issue has been identified, and so no alternatives are developed. For example, management of conventional oil and gas has not been raised as an issue. Conventional oil and gas leasing and development would be analyzed under Management Common to All Alternatives.