On March 5, 2026, the Dept. of the Interior, acting through the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) issued a pre-publication copy of proposed amendments to financial assurance rules governing the licensing of exploration and production of offshore oil & gas and end of project decommissioning of the related facilities. The proposed new rules, if enacted, will re-open drilling and production to companies disadvantaged by the April 2024 Amendments. Those earlier amendments had the effect of restricting new drilling and production to the largest and best capitalized companies which were able to satisfy the higher financial qualifications. The net effect of the 2024 Amendments was to stymie new projects undertaken by independent companies by imposing roughly $6 billion of additional “financial assurance” requirements on smaller companies, and costing the industry about $484 million in annual compliance costs.

The proposed rules will be posted to the Federal Register on March 9, 2026 as a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. Consistent with administrative procedures governing these matters, comments will be accepted for 60 days thereafter, after which the agency will hold hearings or render a final rule.

The NOPR itself can be accessed at: https://federalregister.gov/d/2026-04517 ; and at: https://govinfo.gov (Prior to publication, these links will take you to the as yet unpublished version of the NOPR.)