similar model is being developed for oil. New OCS sales were then proposed in line with helping to meet the deficits. Different alternative schedules were tested with respect to their impact on demand.

These different options were also reviewed from the perspective of receipt of fair market value. The size and frequency of sales can induce or inhibit a competitive market which in turn affects the Government's receipt of fair market value.

Under the proposed five-year schedule, an environmental impact statement based upon detailed analysis of all appropriate data will be prepared for each proposed OCS oil and gas lease sale included in the five-year schedule.

No sales are scheduled on the Atlantic OCS or in the Gulf of Alaska. However, studies of the environment, economics, natural resources, and other regional factors of these areas are being and will be carefully analyzed. An in-house data reconnaissance study on the Mid-Atlantic area has been completed. 1/

The Bureau of Land Management has awarded contracts to independent research groups for environmental and socio-economic analysis of Alaska, Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf of Mexico areas. The Bureau of

Library Research Project Mid-Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf (Reconnaissance), Dept. of Interior, Bureau of Land Management, December, 1972.

Land Management is also currently working closely with the Council on Environmental Quality and other Federal agencies to provide, as a result of current contract and in-house studies, the information necessary for the implementation of the President's directive in his April 18, 1973 Energy Message, to assess the environmental impact of oil and gas production on the Atlantic OCS and in the Gulf of Alaska. The proposed schedule has indicated that if CEQ's study of the environmental impact determines that development in these areas can proceed in an environmentally satisfactory manner, lease sales in one or both areas will be added to the proposed schedule at the earliest practicable time.

In January, 1974, the President directed that OCS leasing be accelerated to 10 million acres beginning in 1975. A revised schedule will be issued to reflect this directive.

E. Activity, Environment, and Impact from the Five-Year Schedule in the Gulf of Mexico

Sales tentatively included in the proposed five-year sched

ule are shown on Attachment B.

2. Development

Table 3 indicates the intensity of activity that will be

required in order to develop the hydrocarbon reserves believed to

underline the Gulf of Mexico areas included in the five-year schedule.

The coastal zone of the Gulf of Mexico is richly endowed

with estuaries and coastal marshes. Over 200 estuarine systems extend from Florida Bay and the famous Ten Thousand Islands of the Everglades to the Hypersaline Laguna Madre of the Southwest Texas coast. It is estimated that there are about 12.7 million acres of estuary and coastal marsh habitat in the five states bordering the Gulf of Mexico. This 12.7 million acres is about 45% of the total estuary and coastal marsh area in the contiguous 48 states, and about two-thirds is coastal marshes and one-third estuarine water area. It is this area of shallow

estuaries and marshes that makes the Gulf of Mexico so productive of fish and wildlife resources. 1/

1/ U. S. Congress, Senate, Report of the Secretary of the Interior to the U. S. Congress, the National Estuarine Pollution Study, 91st Congress, Second Session, March 1970.

1/ All figures are for development over the life of the leases issued during the five-year period. 2/ Estimated 80% of proposed offering in this sale will be leased.

3/ This assumes that some of the leases will have expired or will have been relinquished.

4/ Includes approximately 3,100 miles of common carrier pipeline.

5/ Information not available at this time, but a large, well developed infrastructure exists in the Texas coastal area for handling oil and gas production.

USGS Monthly Engineering Report, September 1973, pp. C-4, C-6. **Status June 30, 1973.

From the shoreline of the barrier islands of the Gulf, waters deepen gradually at a rate of about six feet per mile out to depths of about 300 feet, where the gradient increases more rapidly out to the shelf break or continental slope. In some areas the shelf is more than 100 miles wide. The Gulf coastal area lies, generally, in a zone of transition between tropical and temperate weather patterns. The climate is mild (mean temperature 69° F.) and the area receives considerable precipitation (55 inches annually). Wind flows are complicated, particularly in the cold months, when the normal track of disturbance traveling west to east lies near the coast.

The Gulf of Mexico is defined ecologically as a high energy system in which the naturally generated energy supply is sufficient to maintain a large and diverse population of plant and animal life. The extensive shallow water area of the continental shelf provides a broad expanse of nutrient laden substrate that tends to concentrate commercial species of fish where they can be caught readily.

The coastal area in and adjacent to the Gulf of Mexico offers wintering and nesting areas for a large proportion of the waterfowl population of the United States. It is the southern terminal for much of the Central Flyway and both the Mississippi and Atlantic Flyways. Twenty-five national wildlife refuges, including 486,780 acres are

located in the area. These are distributed as follows: