The debate about managing the natural resources on America's
vast tracts of federal land usually begins with oil and natural
gas, and it often ends there, too. A Government Accountability
Office study out this month shows a big reason why: That's where
the money is. The GAO reports that extraction firms brought
$98.6 billion of oil, gas, coal and other resources to market in
2011 and paid $11.4 billion in lease and royalty payments into
federal coffers. That is a small amount relative to the whole
federal budget. But it is not trivial, as evidenced by coastal
states that for years have fought to obtain a big cut of
offshore drilling royalty revenue, even though the territory and
those who regulate it are both federal. The GAO notes that oil
and gas royalties are "one of the largest non-tax sources of
revenue to the federal government." These figures, in turn,
represent an industry that helps sate the nation's ravenous
demand for energy and improve its trade deficit. For all of
these reasons, economically viab