Oil Drilling

A plan proposed Thursday by the Interior Department would open up new drilling on federal waters off California and off the coast of Florida for the first time in decades.

The Interior Department announced a second sale of 80 million acres of the Gulf, set for March. The sales stop at the Florida-Alabama state line.

Residents of Franklin County gathered to celebrate Gov. Ron DeSantis' recent signing of a law that bans drilling within 10 miles of the Apalachicola River Basin.

It is the latest development in a controversy that spurred state lawmakers in April to pass a measure aimed at preventing oil drilling near the Apalachicola River and Apalachicola Bay.

The bill on his desk would ban oil drilling within 10 miles of the Apalachicola River Basin

The measure passed Legislature unanimously but has not yet reached the governor's desk.

The judge wrote that a spill "would have catastrophic consequences due to the proximity of the well to nearby streams, wetlands and ponds.”

The policy dispute follows loud opposition to a proposed oil drilling project in the Apalachicola Basin. Opponents worry the project could hurt the environment as well as the economy.

Incoming President Trump has vowed to overturn Biden's executive order.

President Joe Biden is moving to ban new offshore oil and gas drilling in most U.S. coastal waters, an effort to block possible action by the incoming Trump administration to expand offshore drilling.

The citizen group Apalachicola Riverkeeper has challenged the Department of Environmental Protection to prevent drilling in the floodplain.

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection has OK'd a draft permit in Calhoun County. But Apalachicola Riverkeeper, a citizens group, contends there is a 100% failure rate of wells drilled there.