Title: Removing Barriers to Energy Independence Act
Policy area: Energy

Summary:
Removing Barriers to Energy Independence Act
This bill requires the Department of the Interior to assess an administrative fee to recover the cost of processing protests filed on oil and gas lease sales, application for permits to drill, and right-of-way applications for oil and gas operations on federal land.

[Congressional Bills 115th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 6087 Introduced in House (IH)]

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115th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 6087

   To authorize the Secretary of the Interior to recover the cost of 
    processing administrative protests for oil and gas lease sales, 
 applications for permits to drill, and right of way applications, and 
                          for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             June 13, 2018

  Ms. Cheney (for herself, Mr. Gianforte, Mr. Gohmert, Mr. Bishop of 
Utah, and Mr. Gosar) introduced the following bill; which was referred 
                 to the Committee on Natural Resources

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
   To authorize the Secretary of the Interior to recover the cost of 
    processing administrative protests for oil and gas lease sales, 
 applications for permits to drill, and right of way applications, and 
                          for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Removing Barriers to Energy 
Independence Act''.

SEC. 2. ADMINISTRATIVE PROTEST PROCESS REFORM.

    Section 17 of the Mineral Leasing Act (30 U.S.C. 226) is amended by 
adding at the end the following:
    ``(q) Protest Filing Fee.--
            ``(1) In general.--Before processing any protest filed 
        under this section, the Secretary shall collect a filing fee 
        from the protestor to recover the cost for processing documents 
        filed for each administrative protest.
            ``(2) Amount.--The filing fee shall be calculated as 
        follows:
                    ``(A) For each protest filed in a submission not 
                exceeding 10 pages in length, the base filing fee shall 
                be $150.
                    ``(B) For each submission exceeding 10 pages in 
                length, an addition to the base filling fee, an 
                assessment of $5 per page in excess of 10 pages shall 
                apply.
                    ``(C) For protests that include more than one oil 
                and gas lease parcel, right-of-way, or application for 
                permit to drill in a submission, an additional 
                assessment of $10 per additional lease parcel, right-
                of-way, or application for permit to drill shall apply.
            ``(3) Adjustment.--
                    ``(A) In general.--Beginning on January 1, 2020, 
                and annually thereafter, the Secretary shall adjust the 
                filing fees established in this subsection to whole 
                dollar amounts to reflect changes in the Producer Price 
                Index, as published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 
                for the previous 12 months.
                    ``(B) Publication of adjusted filing fees.--At 
                least 30 days before the filling fees as adjusted under 
                this paragraph take effect, the Secretary of the 
                Interior shall publish notification of the adjustment 
                of such fees in the Federal Register.''.
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