Biden Seeks to Shield Taxpayers From Costs of Cleaning Up Aging Offshore Oil Wells

A new Biden administration plan for ensuring oil companies have enough money set aside to clean up old offshore platforms is being panned as a potential blow to domestic energy production as well as dozens of independent companies extracting crude from the Gulf of Mexico.

The proposed rule advanced by the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management marks the latest attempt to ensure taxpayers aren’t on the hook to pay for more than $40 billion in estimated decommissioning expenses, even if current and past owners file for bankruptcy protection. The federal government has struggled for years to set financial assurance requirements for aging offshore oil and gas infrastructure that may date back to the 1950s and has passed through many hands since.