Harold Hamm Urges Consistency In US Oil And Gas Regulation

Shale pioneer Harold Hamm, the founder of Continental Resources, has called for the uncertainty in U.S. oil and gas regulations to end so that the industry can have clearer advance plans on drilling and production operations.

The current U.S. Administration’s policies regarding oil and gas are “like riding a roller coaster,” Hamm told oil industry executives and politicians in Oklahoma City, as carried by Bloomberg.

“It’s so important that we have an energy policy that’s lasting and somebody can’t tinker with it from one administration to the next,” according to the shale tycoon who has been criticizing the Biden Administration for its “failed policies on energy.”

Last year, when gasoline prices were soaring in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Hamm said, referring to the U.S. Administration:

“They are not giving us any break out here in the field to produce more hydrocarbons,” adding that leasing was not happening and access to federal permits was not enough.

Reduced access to drilling on federal lands is only raising energy costs, the shale mogul said at this weekend’s event in Oklahoma City.

“When the federal leases were pulled off the table with this latest administration, it took a full year just to modify everybody’s drilling plans,” Bloomberg quoted Hamm as saying.

The U.S. oil and gas industry, represented by the American Petroleum Institute (API) and 13 other energy trade associations, urged last week the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to revise a proposed rule on federal leasing and called on the Biden Administration “to prioritize the energy needs of the American people by developing fair and consistent federal leasing regulations.”

The associations expressed concern over the damaging impact the rule could have on American energy security. It imposes unreasonable new financial burdens on lessees and operators, the associations said in comments to the proposed rule.

“Because of the vital importance of energy production on public lands, overreaching land management regulations place our domestic energy supply at risk,” Holly Hopkins, API Vice President of Upstream Policy, said in a statement.