Interior Department
ORG
Interior Interior Department
A House Republican began a broad investigation on an Interior Department program that is expected to give billions of dollars in benefits over the next five years to companies that pump oil and gas on federal territory. That article, drawing on the Interior Department's budget plan for next year, reported that the administration expected to give more than $7 billion worth of ''royalty relief'' to companies producing oil and gas on federal leases in the Gulf of Mexico. In his letter to the Interior Department, Mr. Pombo said the government had not been consistent in carrying out the 10-year-old law, called the Deep Water Royalty Relief Act, and had become embroiled in litigation. A House Republican began a broad investigation on Wednesday of an Interior Department program that is expected to give billions of dollars in benefits over the next five years to companies that pump oil and gas on federal territory. That article, putting forth the Interior Department's budget plan for next year, reported that the administration expected to give more than $7 billion worth of royalty relief to companies producing oil and gas on federal leases in the Gulf of Mexico. The program allows the Interior Department, which leases tens of millions of acres of publicly owned land and coastal waters, to let companies pump large volumes of oil and gas in deep waters without paying the government a royalty on their sales.