Roughly a quarter of all crude oil and more than a tenth of all natural gas was produced on territory owned by the federal government in 2021. Though offshore natural gas production has dwindled in recent years, crude oil production on public lands has increased.
While energy production has increased on federal lands, the total amount of land leased to oil and gas developers has gone down since 2008. More than half of all land leased to oil and gas companies remains unused for production.
