Interior’s Salazar accuses O&G industry of engaging in ‘election-year politics’

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar fired back at the oil and gas industry Tuesday, telling reporters on a conference call that recent attacks on the Obama administration’s policies have “all the flavor and deception of election-year politics,” according to the New York Times.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar (Split Estate)
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar (Split Estate)

Last week the Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States (IPAMS) issued a report skewering Salazar for reversing the Bush administration on natural gas leases on BLM land near iconic national parks in Utah.

According to the Associated Press, Salazar said huge swaths of federal land were leased for oil and gas drilling last year and another 38 lease sales are scheduled for next year, but that the new administration wants a more balanced approach to domestic energy production – one that gives more weight to renewable energy.

“We believe that our oil and gas leasing program is robust, but it is also a program that we have brought back into balance,” Salazar said. “But you wouldn’t know it if you listened to the untruths coming out of some of the corners of the oil and gas industry.”

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