A Texas oil company has agreed to relinquish an oil and gas lease that covers more than 7,500 acres in the Lewis and Clark National Forest not far from Glacier National Park in Montana.

The move by Moncrief Oil and Gas Master, LLC comes out of negotiations it had with The Wilderness Society to avoid going to court over the lease in the Badger-Two Medicine area. There was no mention of a settlement payment, though the Wyss Foundation, which helped with the negotiations, is known for spending millions of dollars to protect wild spaces.

The 7,640-acre lease was first issued in 1982 and had been held by Moncrief for more than three decades. Moncrief’s lease was cancelled by the Department of Interior in early 2017. This action was challenged in federal court in Washington, D.C., and overturned, with the lease reinstated in June 2019. The district court’s ruling and lease reinstatement had been appealed by conservation, sportsmen, and Blackfeet interests, and their appeal was pending before the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals when the settlement was reached. 

“The Wilderness Society thanks Mr. W.A. Moncrief, Jr. for his willingness to negotiate, and we are pleased to have been able to secure the retirement of this lease," said Jamie Williams, TWS president. "We are also deeply grateful to Hansjörg Wyss and the Wyss Foundation for helping make this critical step possible. We look forward to working with our partners in the Blackfeet Nation and other stakeholders to obtain permanent protections for this important area of our nation's public lands.”

Moncrief Oil officials said in a statement that while they believed "this valuable oil and gas lease could have been developed while protecting and even benefiting the wilderness, the sensitivity to this special area outweighs development."

The 132,000-acre Badger-Two Medicine area has had a series of lease retirements over the past decade. Most recently, in 2016 , Devon Energy agreed that in return for sunk costs it would voluntarily relinquish its 15 leases within the Badger Two Medicine area (totaling 23,000 acres).

There now remains only one oil and gas leaseholder in the Badger-Two Medicine area, Solenex LLC. The company’s 6,200-acre lease was cancelled by the government in 2016, but reinstated in 2018 after the D.C. District Court ruled for Solenex. This case is currently in the United States Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C.

Located between Glacier National Park, the Bob Marshall Wilderness, and the Blackfeet Indian reservation, the Badger- Two Medicine Area is within an area of Montana’s Rocky Mountain Front that Congress withdrew from future oil and gas leasing in 2006. 

“Today’s oil and gas lease retirement announcement is a historic and proud day in our decades’ long effort to protect the Badger-Two Medicine area, sacred to the Blackfeet Nation and connected to Glacier National Park," said Theresa Pierno, president and CEO of the National Parks Conservation Association. "The wild lands are surrounded by Glacier, the Bob Marshall Wilderness complex, and the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, and are home to clear and clean rivers, stunning mountain vistas and room to roam for bears, wolves and wolverines.

“We have always preferred to see oil companies like Moncrief Oil negotiate the end of their leasing agreement in this wild area, vs. litigate. While the leadership at Solenex oil has chosen to remain the only company still sitting in court instead of the settlement table, the National Parks Conservation Association remains unwavering in our support to bring justice to the Blackfeet Nation by permanently protecting the Badger-Two Medicine region," she added.