U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, today issued the following statement after the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) held a lease sale in Alaska’s Cook Inlet. The lease sale was the first to be held in Alaska’s federal offshore waters in almost a decade.

“This lease sale is good news for the future of affordable energy in southcentral Alaska, and a good sign for our ability to develop more of the prolific resources in Alaska’s OCS,” Murkowski said. “I appreciate the new administration’s decision to move forward with this sale, and hope it marks the return of regular sales that restore access to more of our federal waters.”

Lease Sale 244 encompassed 1.09 million acres within the Cook Inlet Planning Area. According to BOEM, the tracts made available for leasing contain an estimated 215 million barrels of oil and 571 billion cubic feet of natural gas. The bids in yesterday’s sale totaled more than $3 million. More information is available on BOEM’s website.

Murkowski is chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.