U.S. Offshore Areas Restricted from Energy Leasing

Geospatial boundaries identify offshore U.S. areas where oil, gas, renewable energy, or mineral leasing is restricted by Presidential orders or acts like the National Marine Sanctuaries Act. The Department of the Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management maintains this data, which was last updated in April 2026. It includes areas designated as Marine National Monuments and other withdrawals.

Use Cases

• Map lease-restricted zones using geospatial boundaries to support environmental impact assessments.
• Analyze overlap between withdrawal areas and proposed energy projects using polygon features.
• Identify regions under restriction by the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act for regulatory compliance checks.

Strengths

• Data is maintained by the authoritative Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM).
• Includes restrictions from multiple legal authorities and lease types.
• Available in multiple geospatial formats including GeoJSON, KML, and GPKG.

Limitations

• Boundaries are not official records and are for cartographic use only, not for area calculations.
• Specific row counts, column details, and temporal coverage of the restrictions are not provided.

Provenance

Source

Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), U.S. Department of the Interior.

Collection Method

Compiled from legal authorities and administrative designations.

Time Range

null

Freshness

Updated in April 2026.

Geography

U.S. Outer Continental Shelf and marine areas under BOEM authority.