Interior caught in the act?

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) wrote a letter [PDF] last week to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, calling on the federal agency to revamp its data publication practices and publish "accurate, complete, and useful" data for the American people. IER director of communications Benjamin Cole explains. "Every year, the Energy Information Administration releases what's called the 'Annual Energy Review,'" he explains. "The numbers last year indicated that production of oil and gas on federal land was down. It turned out that actually there's been a slight uptick -- leading us to wonder How could they have gotten it so wrong?" IER also says the Interior has been unwilling to provide accurate data regarding leasing activity in the Gulf of Mexico following the BP oil spill. "The Department of Interior was claiming on their new lease category revised leases -- which is leases that were stopped when the Deepwater Horizon accident happened, and then were revised when they opened up production again in the Gulf," he says...more