BLM opens 130,000 acres in Colorado to boost oil and gas production

By Jason Blevins | The Colorado Sun

Planned lease auctions started Tuesday, with one of the largest offerings in more than 20 years that set a revenue record as the Trump administration reverses Biden-area slowdown

The BLM on Tuesday leased 14 oil and gas parcels spanning 7,895 acres in Colorado for more than $6.7 million, setting a revenue record in one of one of the largest state lease sales in at least 20 years. 

And more are coming as the BLM plans the largest sale in more than two decades in March 2026 and the second largest in December, with a total of 174 parcels spanning nearly 124,000 acres offered in both auctions.

The pending auctions reveal the Trump administration’s stark shift from President Joe Biden, who offered fewer acres of public land for oil and gas development than any administration since WWII. 

Since 2022, the BLM has sold only three leases to energy developers in Colorado, covering a little more than 400 acres. There were no new oil and gas leases offered or sold in 2023 and only one parcel was offered and sold in 2024. Energy companies have 2,169 producing leases on 1.47 million acres of BLM land in Colorado. 

The lease sale Tuesday averaged $844 an acre. It was the first lease sale conducted under the Trump administration’s budget bill, which reset the royalty rate at 12.5%, down from the Biden administration’s 16.67% set in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. The reduction of the royalty rate “is expected to spur additional leasing and drilling activity, which in turn supports increased domestic energy production and strengthens U.S. energy security,” reads a statement from the BLM Colorado Office announcing the sale.

Taxpayers for Common Sense, a 30-year-old federal budget watchdog group, has long advocated for an increase to the 12.5% royalty rate set in the 1920s. This week the group said U.S. taxpayers stood to lose $15.5 million in royalty revenue in the next 12 years from the rate reduction on the Colorado leases the BLM sold Tuesday.

“Taxpayers will once again be shortchanged as companies lock in decades of drilling under terms that don’t reflect the true value of America’s oil and gas resources,” reads a report from Taxpayers for Common Sense.

50,988 acres hit the lease auction block in December

In December, the BLM is planning to auction 60 oil and gas lease parcels in Colorado across 50,988 acres in Garfield, Jackson, Mesa, Moffat, Rio Blanco, and Routt counties.

A 305-page environmental analysis under the National Environmental Policy Act looked at how drilling on 61 proposed parcels covering 51,068 acres might impact air quality, greenhouse gas emissions and socioeconomic conditions in nearby communities. The BLM estimated a full leasing of all 61 parcels would deliver $3.89 million in revenue to the state and federal governments. Doug Vilsack, the director of the BLM in Colorado, in June concluded that leasing all but one of the parcels — so 60 parcels covering 50,988 acres — aligned with regional land use plans and “will not significantly affect the quality of the human environment.” (Public comment on the December lease sale is closed.)

READ THE COMPLETE STORY AT THE COLORADO SUN