US President Barack Obama will announce today his plans to allow expanded offshore drilling in US waters for the first time in more than two decades.
According to reports the administration has decided to continue with a Bush administration plan to open areas of the Atlantic to offshore drilling for oil and gas. This will begin with a lease sale in 2011 for areas of the coast of Virginia.
Other Mid-Atlantic and South-Atlantic areas are expected to be opened in the years ahead, as well as areas currently restricted off Florida's Gulf Coast.
However, the North Atlantic and Pacific coasts will not be opened, according to reports, and the Department of the Interior is expected to cancel oil and gas leasing in Alaska's Bristol Bay, due to environmental concerns.
For more than 20 years, offshore drilling has been banned on most of the US continental shelf.
The Obama administration is hoping to gain conservative support for climate change legislation. However, he may lose Democratic support in the process. Ten Senate Democrats from coastal states signed a letter stating that they would be unwilling to vote for a climate bill that significantly expands offshore drilling.
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