Alternative Energy Production and Alternate Uses of Existing Facilities on the Outer Continental Shelf

The RIA could be found by RIN number in the Advanced Docket Search at Regulations.gov. The RIA was in a document entitled "Fiscal Cost-Benefit Analysis to Support the Rulemaking Process for 30 CFR 285 Governing Alternative Energy Production and Alternate Uses of Existing Facilities on the Outer Continental Shelf." This document is labeled "AD30 Final Tech. Report Ice MMS 2008-0627" in the Advanced Docket Search results. It could not be found using the keyword search "alternative energy." The MMS.gov site search did not readily return a page about the rulemaking using several searches for "alternative energy," "rulemaking," etc. A Google search for the name of the proposed regulation returned a page that had directions to the advanced docket search and links to several of the related documents such as the environmental assessment, but it does not link directly to the cost-benefit analysis.

Many, but not all, pieces of data are sourced.

The origins of some input assumptions (e.g., low, intermediate, and high payment levels) are not clear. The assumptions work in concert with each other and it is unlikely that they will all hold simultaneously in the future. The RIA has an appendix that guides the reader through use of the spreadsheet model, but it doesn't say how the reader can get the model. Numerous assumptions are based on findings in government or technical studies.

It is not clear what the low, intermediate, and high results mean—are these regulatory alternatives or possible alternative scenarios that will occur for some other undisclosed reasons? (This is explained better in the rule.) The general nature of what they're doing in the analysis is understandable. It is decently organized, yet the sheer number of variables in the model (along with a horde of abbreviations) made for a difficult read.

MMS chose "intermediate" payment case and says the economic analysis guided this decision.

The agency did not maximize calculated net financial benefits to the government, but it may have maximized net social benefits by choosing an option that produces lower net revenues but does not make any projects unprofitable. The rationale for each decision on payments, however, is usually explained by reference to rates MMS charges for oil and gas leases, plus some comments to the effect that MMS does not want to discourage renewable energy. Thus, the rationale is somewhat vague. The proposed rule discusses the RIA, saying that it identified scenarios in which the federal government would make money by allowing use of the OCS (the intermediate and high payment scenarios) but then on 39444 says "Given the assumptions agreed upon with OMB, the industry would have developed, with or without the new rule; therefore, this rule would not determine the amount of money to be generated and spent, but rather who would spend it." This is odd because the whole point of the RIA is to evaluate the effect of the regulation, whether the industry will develop or not isn't the question but whether it will develop as much as it would without.

Measures and goals are not established. If the primary concern is lease revenues, then the proposed rule could have established goals for these.

There are no explicit provisions. Lease revenues and projects actually undertaken would, presumably, be easy ways to track this. However, the RIA does not project effects related to greater certainty of property rights, so the comparison would not provide a complete assessment of the regulation's effects.