While the Bureau of Land Management and the United States Forestry Service prepare to auction off some two to three million acres of the United States of America’s public lands within a five-year period on behalf of Uncle Sam, most of that land is not smack-dab on the waterfront. There are, however, swathes of shoreline up for grabs along the West Coast that are eligible for sale whose potential sale would surely impact surf access and no doubt surfers themselves.
And, in a similar predicament, our coastlines are under their own very real if slightly less publicized existential threat at the moment thanks to a motion to lease USA seafloor to foreign drilling and mining interests. Yes, more seafloor drilling and probing hardware could be stationed just offshore of a surf break near you, according to the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC). Such as it is, unless you happen to have your hands in some of the deep-pocketed foreign interests licking that are their prospecting chops, little if any good will come of this as far as you’re concerned, dear reader.
The lease sale will purportedly bear no fruit for public coffers, but the listing of 250 million acres scheduled under the massive budget reconciliation bill proposed by the commander in chief of this here nation—and vanguard of modern-world public lands—is supposedly to make way for affordable housing. Time will tell.
Checks and balances aside, how do you fancy (more) tar along your beaches, more commercial ships on the horizon, more dead marine life washing ashore through your lineup, and more oil spills? While there’s no measuring the damage that could take place, one thing is for certain: Regardless of any politics, it’s a numbers game, and with more drilling (and seismic testing) offshore comes more of the aforementioned eyesores, pollution, and catastrophes.
And it’s not just our beaches and wave-dancing folly that might be at stake, but entire coastal livelihoods. The commercial fishing industry in particular, which has recently celebrated a number of major deregulatory victories, might not be so pleased with this little twist of fate.
And of course there’s the environment: “These waters are home to critical marine life, provide spaces for communities to connect with nature, and boost multibillion-dollar fishery and recreation economies. BOEM’s new offshore drilling plan would jeopardize all of this.”
That offshore drilling plan includes “Outer Continental Shelf Planning Areas” in the Gulf, both the Atlantic and Pacific Coasts, and waters offshore of Alaska.
Lest you think this sort of thing couldn’t happen, know that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is already underway with a proposal for American Samoa, per a Department of the Interior press release: “On April 8, 2025, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management received a formal request for a lease sale from U.S.-based company Impossible Metals. In response, BOEM will begin a multi-step evaluation process grounded in science, public engagement and environmental stewardship.”
It is a dog-eat-dog world out there to wit: One industry claims a victory only to find itself facing a larger, toothier beast lining up for its outsized slice of our finite little pie we call Earth. We’ve reached out to the National Resource Defense Council for comment but have heard back nil as of yet. We have a feeling they might be busy…