Eastern Gulf lease sale set for Dec. 5
  by: OilOnline
  Tuesday, November 06, 2001

The Minerals Management Service will conduct Eastern Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 181 on Dec. 5. The sale will be held at the Riverside Hilton Hotel in New Orleans. This will be the first Eastern Gulf lease sale since 1988. The area in the upcoming sale is near the deepwater Crazy Hose project, one of the largest discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico. The sale area encompasses 256 blocks in the Eastern Gulf outer continental shelf planning area and covers about 1.47 million acres. The sale area contains about 1.25 Tcf of natural gas plus about 185 million barrels of oil. Blocks in the sale are located in deepwaters due south of Alabama, immediately adjacent to the Central Gulf of Mexico planning area. Acreage offshore Florida's west coast is not included in the sale.